VIDEO: The 2014 Yellow Table

Revenues for the world’s 50 largest construction equipment manufacturers fell -10% last year to US$ 163 billion, according to iC’s annual Yellow Table ranking of the world’s largest construction equipment manufacturers. A downturn in the global mining industry, the continued slowdown in China and the depreciation of the Japanese Yen were the key drivers of the fall.

In terms of rankings, the global no.1 and no.2, Caterpillar and Komatsu, were unchanged from last year and Volvo Construction Equipment swapped places with Hitachi to take third place. Meanwhile Liebherr and Terex each moved up two places to no. 5 and no. 6 respectively as Zoomlion and Sany felt the impact of their falling domestic market.

The downturn in the global mining industry, pulled revenues down for many earthmoving equipment manufacturers last year. Although the Yellow Table attempts to measure revenues from construction equipment sales, and excludes companies that serve only the mining industry, it is inevitable that a downturn in mining will impact on many of the companies in the league table.

Meanwhile the slowdown in China had an impact across the domestic construction equipment sector. Besides the falls for Zoomlion and Sany, Lonking, XGMA and Chenggong Lost places. XCMG, Liugong and Sunward held their ground, and Shantui was the only Chinese manufacturer to improve its standing.

Another key factor in this year’s Yellow Table was the depreciation of the Japanese Yen over the course of 2013. The Japanese currency was some 22% weaker than a year previously, which had an impact for the league table, which is based on revenues in US Dollar terms.

For Example, Komatsu’s revenues from construction equipment sales in the 2013 calendar year were JPY 1723 billion, compared to JPY 1678 billion the previous year – a +2.3% increase.

However, there was a negative effect in terms of the Yellow Table ranking in Dollars. The company’s converted revenues fell from US$ 21.0 billion in last year’s Yellow Table to US$ 17.6 billion this year – a -16% decline.

This currency effect contributed to slides down the rankings for Hitachi, Kobelco, Tadano and Furukawa.

The full Yellow Table report is available in the April edition of iC. Non-subscribers can purchase the report as a standalone product from KHL’s Information Store. It is available as either a single year report, or as a compendium of the last five years of Yellow Table reports.