Ewart quickly found customers requesting help engineering and constructing industrial facilities, especially coal-handling systems.

By 1894, the three companies had constructed facilities for railroads including the New York Central and Hudson, the Philadelphia and Reading, and the Chicago and West Michigan.

By its 50th anniversary in 1925, Link-Belt operated ten large manufacturing plants and 27 branch offices across the United States.

This returned Link-Belt to the Eastern Iowa area where Will Ewart had invented his replaceable-link drive belt.

Harvard economist Clayton Christiansen analyzed the mechanical excavator industry to understand why disruptive technology innovations frequently cause well-managed companies to fail.

Christiansen tracked excavator companies navigating two key technology changes: moving to gasoline power and switching to hydraulic mechanisms.

Following gasoline power, 1928 and onward included less-radical transitions to diesel engines and electric motors.

Clayton also noted the surviving companies integrated new articulated-boom technology, "which allowed longer reach, bigger buckets, and better down-reaching flexibility.

This disruptive period in excavator history set the background for the children's classic Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel, based on a machine from Marion Steam Shovel.Early adoption of hydraulics (1936 onward) Clayton found Link-Belt was part of a much smaller group surviving the transition to hydraulics.

Operators would stand all day at the crane controls, pulling large levers to engage the cables.

[3] A few other companies survived by shifting to the upper end of the market, producing dragline excavators for strip mining.

which changed to Marion Power Shovel and focused on dragline systems including ones that helped dig the Panama Canal.

Link-Belt faced strong new competition from other hydraulic innovators, which Clayton identifies as Case, John Deere, Drott, Ford, Bamford (JCB), Poclain, International Harvester, Caterpillar, O & K, Demag, Liebherr, Komatsu, and Hitachi.

Link-Belt Speeder succeeded in competing against the new entrants, making the company a showcase for managing disruptive innovation.

Link-Belt Speeder's rapid adoption of the new hydraulic technologies let it survive where most other established companies failed.This early adoption of hydraulics launched Link-Belt Speeder to the forefront of the crane and crane-shovel excavator markets worldwide.

To address this and expand sales in Asia, Link-Belt Speeder established an agreement with Japan's Sumitomo Heavy Industries.

FMC began an aggressive long-term capital expansion plan for Link-Belt's manufacturing facilities and product lines.

With the prime interest rate peaking at 22%, businesses cut construction plans and FMC began layoffs.

In an effort to save the older Cedar Rapids plants, FMC reorganized the construction group.

From its 1979 peak of 2,300 workers in two Cedar Rapids plants, FMC Link-Belt reduced to only 450 Iowa employees by 1985.

FMC consolidated Link-Belt operations to the newer Kentucky plants in Lexington and Bowling Green.

As American deindustrialization continued, FMC turned to long-time Japanese partner Sumitomo Heavy Industries.

In 1986, FMC and Sumitomo expanded their relationship by forming a joint venture (JV) named Link-Belt Construction Equipment Company.

By the late 1990s, excavators had developed past crane-shovels and become the modern hydraulic machines of today.