By any measure, lift trucks had a much better year in 2003 than the previous two years. Not only were orders up worldwide, but revenues for the largest suppliers moved ahead smartly.

Looking at the five top suppliers on our list - Toyota, Linde, Jungheinrich, NACCO Industries and Crown - combined revenues increased $2.64 billion during fiscal year 2003. That's nearly a 26% surge past 2002 figures. Toyota alone accounted for $1.1 billion of that increase with Linde adding $860 million and Jungheinrich another $350 million.

However, those numbers are much stronger than they might have been without the help of a weaker dollar and a stronger yen and euro than was the case a year earlier. In fact, the yen was up 13% and the euro 20% for the reporting period for these companies.

That said, orders for lift trucks were strong. On a worldwide basis, orders for almost 602,000 lift trucks were placed in 2003. That's a 13% increase over 2002. The strongest geographic region was Asia with a 16% increase to 153,000 units. North America advanced 13% to 169,000 units while Europe showed the smallest growth, just 3% to 259,000 lift trucks. All numbers are from the World Industrial Truck Statistics, a global alliance of industrial truck associations.

To make our Top 20 list, a company must manufacture and sell lift trucks in at least one of the Industrial Truck Association's seven classes of lift trucks. Rankings are based on revenue during each company's most recent fiscal year.

Among the top ten on our list, there was some jockeying in position. Toyota remained in first followed by Linde. Then Jungheinrich moved ahead of NACCO while Crown held on to the fifth spot. Next comes Mitsubishi/Caterpillar, which moved ahead of Komatsu (#7), although both had an excellent year. Similarly, TCM (#8) and Nissan (#9) swapped spots. Rounding out the top ten is Nichiyu.

Gone from that top tier are two companies—Manitou and Fantuzzi. Manitou remains on the list at #14. That's a drop from #8 last year when total revenue, which included trucks for agriculture and construction, was included. This time only Manitou's industrial lift truck business, 27% of its total business or $232 million, was counted. Similarly, Fantuzzi was removed from the list because the vast majority of its business is in port and cargo handling, not industrial lift trucks.

In addition, two other companies - JCB and Merlo - were removed from the list. Both produce trucks for agriculture and construction, and no longer fit into our criteria.

That opened up three new slots on the list.

Hoist Liftruck comes in at #16, doing $50 million in heavy-duty lift trucks. The company's standard counterbalanced trucks run the gamut from 7.5 to 50 tons, and its specialty trucks for extremely heavy loads top out at 125 tons.

Coming in at #18 is Landoll with $25 million in sales. The company had previously offered Bendi and PivotMast trucks until it bought Drexel last year. Previously, Drexel had been on the list by itself.

Anhui Heli, a Chinese lift truck supplier, makes its debut in the 20^th spot with $20 million in sales.

There is one other notable development among suppliers. Last year, Clark was purchased by Young An Hat Co. of Bucheon, South Korea. That led to Clark's exit from bankruptcy. And by the third quarter of last year, Clark had returned to profitability. Not only that, but its revenue, which dropped 37% in 2002, increased nearly 15% to $237 million in 2003, putting it at lucky #13.

Click on the icon to see last year's ranking of lift truck companies.