(TBM Consulting Group: Durham, North Carolina) -- While general cost pressures continue to be the main challenge for manufacturers globally, rising energy costs have reached a new level of concern according to TBM Consulting Group’s sixth annual “Multinational Manufacturing Pulse.” The study found that manufacturers’ level of anxiety over rising energy costs has more than doubled since last year, resulting in an increased commitment to eliminate waste.

Conducted in the third quarter of 2008, the survey polled 1,406 executives from mid-sized to large firms in six major manufacturing countries in the western hemisphere—the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Mexico, and Brazil. The study was done in conjunction with IndustryWeek in the United States.

Fifty-three percent of respondents ranked cost pressures as the biggest hurdle to success in 2009. Nevertheless, 33 percent identified rising energy costs as a source of angst, a dramatic increase from 11 percent in 2008. Issues dealing specifically with quality and people continued to be challenges for manufacturers in the nations surveyed. 

The study also revealed that executives in the six industrial nations surveyed are taking measures to keep market share and maintain a competitive edge during this tumultuous time. Some of these steps include:

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