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Electronics Purchasing
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MRO/DISTRIBUTION - Grainger develops new Web site for 'one-stop' MRO purchases
NEWS - NAPP meeting: Change may create profit opportunity
News - Turtle & Hughes, Linden, N.J.
- Bearing Distributors has acquired Industrial Bearing Service
- Engineered Sales, a subsidiary of Applied Industrial Technologies
- Motion Industries has acquired Bush-Miller Incorporated of York, Pa.
- Cameron & Barkley's electrical division recognizes Gould Shawmut as its top-rated quality supplier for 1998
- Eastman Kodak, Rochester, N.Y., has signed a North American MRO integrated-supply contract with Affiliated Distributors
- imark, a member-owned marketing group serving more than 180 independent electrical distributors, has added two members: A-C Electrical Supplies, Smithtown, N.Y., and DXP Enterprises, Houston, Texas
Office Products & Business Systems
ON THE INTERNET
PRODUCT UPDATE
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Purchasing Hotline
PURCHASING HOTLINE - Do you think your company is a great place for a purchasing professional to work?
- Expect prices for PC monitors to keep climbing well into next year
- Check out new service from U.S. Postal Service
- Keep an eye on international talks that would eliminate duties on information-technology products
- Expect high-tech buying to take off this year
- Here's the outlook for energy pricing for the rest of '99
- Are you up to the competitive challenges of the electronics marketplace?
- Count on air freight rates to stay low at least through the summer, and possibly as late as fourth quarter
- Keep an eye on bill that would increase carriers' liability for goods damaged during sea shipment
- Electronics buyers can expect weak connector prices for the rest of the year
- Get up to speed on the Internet
- Expect prices for disk drives to keep falling
- "Mega-dealers" of office products keep getting stronger
- PC buyers may want to check out this year's PC Expo
- High-speed passenger rail lines may provide cost-effective alternative to air travel in next few years
- Electronic commerce over the Internet continues to rise
- We need your help! If you're actively involved in day-to-day buying of industrial commodities
Economy - An "unrelenting barrage of strong economic reports" has forced economists to add optimism to their 1999 forecasts
- Uncle revised up its estimate for real GDP growth in fourth-quarter 1998
- Housing market loses steam
- The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (oecd) has raised its forecast for U.S. economic growth
- There was something for everybody in the Fed chairman's recent Humphrey-Hawkins testimony before Congress
- Purchasing kicks off 1999 Crystal Ball economic forecast contest
Markets - Because North American economic growth will be much greater than originally thought, forecasters say auto sales
- Start-up company Minnesota Iron & Steel of Nashwauk, Minn., plans to build a steel sheet product mini-mill
- Ethylene inventories recently reached an average six days of supply
- While laptop personal computers represent only 15%-20% of the PC market
- Sales on the Internet will create an e-commerce boom, hitting $1 trillion by 2002
- Watch for a rash of natural gas company acquisitions by U.S. electric interests
- More than 340,000 computer-related jobs have not been filled at U.S. companies
- Personal-computer maker Gateway and online retailer necx
- The outlook for materials handling equipment calls for 6% growth in 1999 orders and a 9% rise in 2000 bookings
- Commerce Undersecretary of Economic Affairs Robert Shapiro sees little chance for a short-term end
- The trade deficit for U.S. lumber and related wood products increased almost 30% in 1998
- Major North American newsprint producers are reducing annual production by 160,000 annual metric tons
- United Technologies Corp. will spend $4.3 billion to buy aerospace-parts maker Sundstrand Corp.
- Dutch electronics group Royal Philips has offered to buy U.S. semiconductor firm vsli technology
- 3Com Corp., the Santa Clara, Calif.-based data communications equipment maker, is buying NBX Corp.
- Copper supply is likely to exceed demand by at least 400,000 metric tons
Prices - Coated paper prices remain flat, but some buyers think the price dive has touched bottom
- Prices for corrugated containers and boxes have started to move up
- Mills have postponed a 4% price increase on stainless steel sheet and strip
- Aluminum prices will probably fall over the next two years
- Platinum will trade this year in a wide $330-$415 range (averaging $378)
- Mexico's largest steelmakers have proposed a 10% hike on hot-rolled sheet
- It's premature for producers to conclude that nonferrous metals prices have hit bottom
- Analyst Joe Moore of Goldman Sachs sees potential for dram price declines in coming weeks
- Polyethylene (PE) producers claim to have won a quiet
- Suppliers have announced 3¢/lb price hikes for March deliveries of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) resins
- Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) resin producers are attempting to end long-term price slippage by implementing a 5¢/lb
- Some polypropylene suppliers have proposed hikes ranging up to 3¢/lb
- While transaction prices for benchmark northern bleached softwood kraft (nbsk) market pulp have fallen below industry list
- Hardwood pulp producers have added $30/tonne to April list prices for northern bleached hardwood kraft
- Hertz, the world's largest car rental company, has raised all non-contract car rental prices in the U.S. by $3/day
- Downward pressure on trans-Atlantic ocean freight rates remains despite steady business
- Excess global capacity for folding carton board and uncertain offshore demand could result in reduced pricing this year
- The national average price for unleaded regular gasoline continues to hover at $1/gallon
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