Fluid Power & Hydraulics

Fluid power as a component layer

Fluid power is the layer that converts an engine or an electric motor into controlled force and flow. It sits inside almost every piece of heavy machinery sold — a tractor, an excavator, a reach stacker, a press — and it is bought twice by the same customer: once as original equipment content specified into a machine platform, and again over the life of that machine as parts, exchange units and remanufactured components.

Pheonix’s global hydraulics report values the total field at USD 42.8 billion in 2025, rising to USD 67.9 billion by 2033 at 5.9 per cent. Mobile applications — construction, agriculture, material handling and mining — carry the majority of that value, with stationary industrial hydraulics taking the remainder.

Why the layer splits in two

The distinction that governs commercial strategy in this segment is between original equipment content, which is designed into a machine at the factory and therefore follows the factory, and aftermarket content, which is consumed wherever the machine works. When machine sourcing shifts across a border, the first pool leaves with the build and the second does not. That is why two suppliers selling into the same machine fleet can report opposite results in the same year, and why Pheonix treats the segment’s coverage as a sourcing question rather than a demand question.

What the segment covers

Hydraulic pumps and motors, directional, proportional and servo valves, cylinders, accumulators, filtration, hose, tube and fittings, hydrostatic transmissions, electrohydraulic control units, and remanufactured or exchange components. Excluded are pneumatic-only systems, plain bearings and pure lubrication equipment.

The first report in this segment covers agricultural machinery hydraulics, including the Brazilian re-sourcing case in which a 13 per cent fall in machine sales and a 48 per cent rise in imports move the opportunity from original equipment to aftermarket.