I rather wonder when he – Mike Rowe is his name – will find himself presiding over a strategy meeting within a US-based Tier 1 supplier to the truck business. It is difficult to think of a worse place to be at the moment.

Hence my surprise when – through the ether - there appears a missive from Caterpillar, describing the speech given by George Taylor, boss of Cat’s Global On-Highway business to the assembled hordes of the Heavy Duty Manufacturer’s Association, at an event called – and I kid you not – ‘Heavy Duty Dialogue ‘07’.

Now were I to find myself in Mr Taylor’s shoes, I’d be running for cover whilst perusing my resume for a group of skill sets some distance away from the Tier 1 supply biz. Something like pro-celebrity penguin herding or the like. But no – GT is bullish; he tells the assembled group – formed out of truck manufacturers – that vertical integration is wrong, there is a better – and in fairness, he did not say ‘third’ way, and that the US truck buyer wants a choice in terms of the major components specified for his truck. “60 per cent of today’s heavy truck engines are manufactured by independent suppliers”, he tells the gathering. He then goes on to explain Cats’ Vision 2002 – which will see the company generate $100 billion in sales revenues by that same year.

Dream on, sonny. Not from the truck biz you won’t. Here comes Paccar - one of Cat’s biggest On-Highway customers – with grand plans for its own engine facility in the US. There goes DaimlerChrysler and its HDEP project and Volvo and its serious warranty bribes to operators opting for a home grown engine. Does this sound like an industry prepared to make room for an independent? No.

Caterpillar is doomed in the On-Highway business. Sure, it may have outlets in the emerging markets, but at what cost? It is not doing business in Europe any more, and its tenure within the NAFTA market looks very short term indeed.

In a few weeks, I shall breathe deeply, and then enter the abode of the damned that is Caterpillar’s Mid-America Show press conference. This feels more like a revivalist meeting than a media event – there is hand-clapping, mantra-chanting and a whole load of hot air about cool air – to whit ACERT, Caterpillar’s take on EGR. But this year, the question has to concern what Caterpillar does next. Cummins has been sharp, and has repositioned itself as a specialist Tier 2 supplier – think XPI – but for Caterpillar, there seems to be no place anymore.