Down 20% in Q3 at Manitowoc

Third-quarter 2016 net sales of US$ 349.8 million were down 20 per cent on the $438.2 million in the same period of 2015.

The decrease was largely attributed to continued deterioration in mobile crane markets, mainly in North America and the Middle East. Helping to offset this was growth in tower crane sales for residential and commercial construction projects, mainly in Western Europe.

Overall a net loss of ($140.0) million was reported for Q3 2016 against an income of $4.8 million in the third-quarter of 2015.

Barry Pennypacker, Manitowoc Company president and chief executive officer, commented, “As previously announced, the mobile crane market continued its downward trend in the third-quarter and remains very challenging. The weak global oil and gas market, coupled with lower used equipment prices, continues to have a negative effect on demand. Our tower crane business continues to perform as expected and we look forward to its continued success as the new line of Hup products are introduced in the fourth-quarter.”

The company said it is accelerating its restructuring activities to drive long-term cash flow generation and margin expansion. Pennypacker continued, “Our priority is to continue to improve our quality, make significant market share gains and right-size the business to current demand levels. We will do this without impacting our long-term strategy of margin expansion, growth, innovation and velocity. We have significantly cut production levels to match the lower demand and accelerated the transition of crawler crane manufacturing from Manitowoc, Wisconsin, to Shady Grove, Pennsylvania. While this will have an adverse impact on our near-term earnings outlook, we expect this action will have a positive impact on our ability to maintain adequate liquidity levels.”

In outlook the company forecasts revenue down approximately 25 to 30 % for the year.