New orders of manufacturing technology in March totaled $543.2 million, up 16.5% over February 2023 orders and just under 2% below March 2022 orders ,according to the latest U.S. Manufacturing Technology Orders Report published by The Association For Manufacturing Technology.

Orders through the first quarter of 2023 totaled $1.36 billion, just 7.5% below the first quarter of 2022, according to the report.

“Based on historical trends, we expected March to be an improvement over February,” said Douglas K. Woods, president of AMT. “In an upside surprise, March 2023 is the first month of orders of over half a billion dollars since IMTS and one of the largest March totals since 2008. While most industries we track increased orders in March 2023, several were particularly boosted, as they were the beneficiaries of last year’s infrastructure and chips bills that have begun to be implemented.”

Construction machinery manufacturers increased their orders in March 2023, ordering the most machines in a single month since April 2008, AMT said.

Contract machine shops — which account for the largest share of orders in a month — almost doubled orders from February 2023 and placed the highest number of orders since IMTS in September 2022.

The aerospace industry placed also placed its highest level of orders this year, while manufacturers of motor vehicle transmissions placed the largest order since June 2022.

“Investments made by automakers show the need for additional internal combustion engine manufacturing capacity as a bridge during the transition to electric vehicles,” said Woods.