Register Today for the Defending Price Seminar Happening Wednesday in Dearborn!
Join us for a unique and timely sales workshop, designed specifically for commercial vehicle parts suppliers! Defending your price requires a team effort. Company attendees should include VPs, commercial directors, sales and marketing managers, pricing analysts, and engineers.
Navistar Engine Group has entered into a contract with South Korean automaker Daewoo Bus to supply diesel engines. The engines will be supplied for Daewoo's two new commercial vehicles, which will fit in the 6.0-ton gross vehicle weight (GVW) and 5.5-ton GVW categories. The engines will also meet Euro III, IV and V emissions standards, offering clean diesel power, fuel efficiency and reliability.
Parts inventory and customer repairs will be quicker thanks to Navistar's decision to implement OEConnection's supply chain and intelligence tools, the truck OEM said.
OEConnection's online parts sourcing and idle inventory reduction tools will help Navistar's 280 International North American dealerships shorten part-cycle times by allowing them to view each others' stock in real time and pull the necessary parts from the supply chain as needed, reducing back orders.
Motor carriers likely will face maximum penalties more often under a new enforcement policy that took effect April 1. In a March 30 Federal Register notice, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration announced a supplemental policy that will change how it now will implement Section 222 of the Motor Carrier Safety Improvement Act of 1999. Section 222 requires FMCSA to assess maximum statutory penalties if a person or company is found to have committed a pattern of violations of critical or acute regulations, or previously committed the same or a related violation of critical or acute regulations.
Until now, FMCSA has defined “pattern of violations” and “previously committed the same or related violation” as three cases closed with findings of violation occurring within the last six years. The “three strikes” also could be two cases that have closed followed by a third case in which violations were discovered during a compliance review or similar audit.
The U.S. economy is in recession and truck sales are well below replacement rates, but America's top 500 private fleets continue to grow their share of the country's total commercial truck population. The companies included in the sixth annual Fleet Owner 500 survey operate nearly 1.16 million trucks and tractors, up from 1.09 million in the 2008 survey. With just over 8 million commercial vehicles running in the U.S., that means America's 500 largest private fleets account for roughly 14 percent of all the trucks on the road.
The credit crisis and its devastating effects on the nation's vehicle builders has also injured thousands of small parts suppliers, and many could fail, one of their executives told Congress yesterday. Wes Smith, president of E&E Manufacturing, testified before the House Small Business Committee at a hearing examining the economic impact of the domestic auto crisis on small suppliers throughout the United States.
"For small suppliers, the drop off in industry volumes can actually be greater, the credit freeze tighter, and the customer risk more significant," he stated. He asked the committee to consider authorizing a parts supplier program within the Small Business Administration to address the needs of small suppliers, saying that "assistance targeted to these manufacturers is critical."
Trucking is just beginning to glimpse benefits from the federal economic stimulus program, which could produce about $1.1 billion in carrier revenue over the next two years for moving materials used in infrastructure projects, industry and federal officials said.
Pike Industries, working nine New England road paving jobs totaling $65 million, will need 25,000 truckloads to move 500,000 tons of asphalt for its current American Recovery and Reinvestment Act work, President Christian Zimmermann told Transport Topics.