13 November 2025
The modern-day global metals and machine building industry are undergoing a period of transformation driven by technological innovations, changes in product demand and geopolitical factors. Metallurgy is facing challenges related to sustainability and environmental requirements, while machine building is actively adapting to automation, digitalization and new market requirements.
Situation in metallurgy
The global crisis in the metallurgy industry is aggravated by the non-market policies of the Chinese authorities, which continue to provide local metallurgical companies with grants, tax incentives, preferential electricity prices and loans on non-market terms. All of this is worsening the overcapacity problem in the global steel industry and causing further disruptions to trade. This is stressed in a statement to the 97th session of the Steel Committee of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Situation in machine building
The machine building industry is the backbone of the world economy. It is not only a driver of technological progress, but also a crucial indicator of the overall health of the global economy. From motor vehicle manufacturing to food processing and energy generation, virtually no industry can go on without the products and innovations of machine building sector.
The global machine building industry is in a complex, multi-dimensional economic situation.
- While some regions, notably Germany, are facing serious challenges and pessimistic outlooks, others, such as the US and China, are showing signs of recovery.
- Export-oriented economies such as South Korea and Japan are overcoming global uncertainties, while certain segments in South Africa are showing growth potential despite general weakness.
- The strengthening Swiss franc and Norway’s energy dependence are shaping Europe outside the EU.
Trends in Metals & Machine Building
Comprehensive global trends such as advancing automation, the integration of artificial intelligence and Industry 4.0, as well as a growing focus on sustainability, will have a significant impact on the sector’s future development. The ability of metal and machine building companies to adapt to these dynamic conditions, drive technological innovation and make strategic decisions in a perilous global environment will be critical to their long-term competitiveness and success.
The machinery and metals industry remains one of the key sectors of the global economy, but they are facing profound changes that contain both challenges and opportunities. Companies that actively embrace these changes and adapt to the new environment will emerge from this phase of uncertainty and expand their position in global competition.
Trend 1. Digital adoption reduces human impact and accelerates home and international market penetration
Nowadays when a company digital presence defines its success, the challenge is to make that visibility authentic, customized and scalable, as well as content marketing and link building processes to be as automated as possible.
Solution to take: Kompass Booster is an innovative visibility solution that positions itself as an effective mix of a digital multi-lingual B2B presentation with a product showcase, a corporate blog, a news timeline and a virtual brand ambassador. It combines the benefits of different communication and sales channels on one platform and allows you to publish information in 26 languages, maximizing your target audience coverage and content visibility.
Business Case: With the Booster International package, AMPCO METAL was able to expand its international online presence, attract the attention of new customers and land at the top of search results for steel exporters.
Trend 2. Supply chain falls heavily dependent on geography and geopolitics
Trade restrictions, conflicts or sanctions can severely disrupt availability and pricing and increase dependence on foreign suppliers, especially in geopolitically sensitive regions. For example, the metals supply chain is highly dependent on specific regions, such as China for rare earth elements, and Russia for nickel.
Solution to take: Proven to be an effective digital prospecting tool, EasyBusiness helps you to customize the right geography to find new customers and plan the most risk-free supply chain possible by using a visualizing feature such as geographic mapping of search results.
Business case: Spanish metal product manufacturer ADDIMEN BIZKAIA used the advantages of EasyBusiness to start its internationalization and enter the markets of Germany and France.
Trend 3: Industry 4.0 and smart manufacturing require a dramatic increase in automation, digitalization and efficiency of all processes
Metallurgy and machine building are industries that urgently need to optimize, extend and digitalize their international sales processes, including technical segmentation to find reliable importers and industrial suppliers, smart generation of a prospect database and its integration into their own CRM.
Solution to take: Sales Accelerator, as EasyBusiness’s online Sales CRM Module, provides 24/7 control over all stages of the sales funnel and fully digitalizes the sales department, setting the employees free from routine operations and manual laborious work.
Business case: Representaciones Técnicas Corominas, a Spanish industrial equipment sales and installation company, used Kompass data-driven solutions to make highly complex prospecting searches and harmonize all sales pipeline processes.
Why use Kompass solutions?
Kompass is an international Martech company specializing in B2B data solutions for sales, marketing, exporting and procurement departments.
Our solutions are designed to digitize prospecting, targeting, market segmentation, lead generation and sales pipeline journey.
Our TOP benefits for metal and machine building companies:
- Leverage our global database of 60 million companies in 70 countries and unique international product & service Kompass classification to confidently identify niche buyers around the world.
- Conduct pinpoint searches using 60 search criteria to instantly generate highly specialized marketing lead lists for downstream processing.
- Optimize B2B lead generation with advanced AI-based semantic search – an indispensable aid in finding complicated technical and technological product positions.
- Accelerate business expansion into new markets with EasyBusiness prospecting platform and Booster multi-lingual and user-friendly visibility packages.
- Export segmented data to .xls, csv and .pdf files, or with our CRM connectors to enrich your own CRM, so that sales teams don’t hunt for leads any more.
Conclusion
Digitalization in metallurgy and machine building allows enterprises to adapt to global trends, be flexible and adaptive to changing market conditions, increase efficiency, capacity, productivity, product quality, expand product range, reduce marketing costs and take into account the environmental aspect of the industry.
At the same time, there are risks associated with economic slowdown, trade conflicts and technological shocks. The future of metals & machine building depends to a large extent on the innovative strength and adaptability of companies.
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