Advanced Manufacturing : Innovation + Job News

When up and running, the Advanced Energy Manufacturing Center will represent a first-of-its-kind effort to make Ohio a leader in creating clean energy jobs.

A groundbreaking is planned for October for the new 20,000-square-foot Center in Lima. The center, a non-profit incubator, will initially house a flexible fabrication and robotic assembly demonstration project. It will focus on several technology clusters including design and development, sustainable energy, advanced materials, agile tooling, additive manufacturing technologies, simulation software and others.

The center is designed to create new, high tech manufacturing jobs in Ohio. The state has a history of manufacturing and innovation, but has lost some manufacturing jobs like much of the Midwest as global economic conditions have shifted. State economic development leaders and government officials in Lima see the center as way to recapture the state's manufacturing tradition by creating new manufacturing solutions and processes.

The center is backed by state and federal dollars, including $1 million the federal government awarded the project in 2009.
 
It's just been awarded a $457,375 state Roadwork Development Grant, and the center has applied for a $1.9 million grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce Economic Development Administration.

A site for the center was chosen and secured within Lima's Ohio Job Ready Site program site located on South Main Street, says Judith Cowan, the center's president. 

Sources: Ohio Department of Development and Judith Cowan, president Ohio Advanced Energy Manufacturing Center
Writer: Feoshia Henderson

Northeast Ohio has expanded its business attraction efforts outside of Ohio, hiring a full-time director to lead an international marketing program designed to attract two to four new companies to the region in the next two years.

Team NEO, a business attraction organization that represents the region's largest chambers of commerce in a 16-county area, last month hired Bernardine R. van Kessel as Director, International Business Attraction. Team NEO also has contracted with PM&P Consultants of Germany to act on its behalf in Europe.

The initiative is financed by a $1-million, two-year grant from the Cleveland Foundation and is intended to reach out not only to European companies but to business interests in Canada and China for renewable energy, biomedical and advanced manufacturing opportunities.

Carin Rockind, Team NEO's vice president of marketing and communications, noted that a new Team NEO report issued last month demonstrated that northeast Ohio is well-positioned for "clean tech" growth. Those industries now represent $12.5 billion, or 7.5 percent of northeast Ohio's economy, but are expected to grow more than 20 percent in the next five years.

"Northeast Ohio in particular has the benefit of tremendous access to transportation systems in terms of rail, highway and port access," she says. "Then, our workforce is accustomed to these particular (high tech) industries."

Rockind says Team NEO has set a first-year goal of 10 "hard leads" (a company that could bring at last 20 new jobs to the region and commit to at least $1 million in capital investment) -- and a goal of 12 such leads in the second. The organization also is developing a process to work with foreign businesses that aren't ready to open new offices here but are interested in U.S. partners.

Sources: Carin Rockind, Team NEO and http://www.clevelandplusbusiness.com/
Writer: Gene Monteith

Does a metal stamping tool with the potential to revolutionize an industry sound ambitious? Maybe. Is it possible? Absolutely.

That's exactly what the founders of M.O.M. Tools have in mind for the metal fabrication business.

M.O.M. (Men of Miami) Tools was established in 2003 by two Miami University graduates, Anthony Lockhart and John Collier. The pair created a patented "Dual-Head" punch for the metal fabrication and fastener industries, with the idea to improve productivity and reduce tooling, maintenance and scrap expenses.

With their innovative product, Collier and Lockhart believe the industry can be revived � with jobs that will stay in Ohio.

Lockhart says the Cleveland-based company found a niche, offering a product that has a longer life and better quality of a "punched" hole than the current tools on the market.

Typically, when a hole is punched through metal, it wants to close itself. The entire process takes "just a milli-fraction of a second," not visible to the naked eye. M.O.M. Tools' Dual-Head system has two cutting mechanisms and a groove to catch excess "flow." And the tool can last up to 15 times longer then conventional tools on the market.

"We want to revolutionize the metal stamping industry," Lockhart says. "Hopefully, by our efforts, we can retain some of the business in this country."

That type of innovation is bound to attract some attention. The Great Lakes Innovation & Development Enterprise (GLIDE) grant program awarded the company $25,000.

"Our goal is to continue to add jobs and continue to grow," Lockhart says. "And these are not minimum wage jobs by any stretch of the imagination."

Source: Anthony Lockhart, M.O.M. Tools
Writer: Colin McEwen

Supported by a $500 loan from an uncle, Swagelok was founded in 1947 by Fred Lennon as the Crawford Fitting Company. Shortly afterward, the business began manufacturing Swagelok tube fitting.

In the beginning, there were just two employees: Fred Lennon and Cullen Crawford, the original design engineer of the Swagelok tube fitting.

Today, the Solon-based company's products are delivered at more than 200 authorized facilities in 57 countries on six continents � by approximately 4,000 employees.

Swagelok products are still designed to provide leak-tight operation, reducing the possibility of fugitive emissions. Its newest product � the Swagelok compact gauge valve � is designed with a purge valve and tube-fitting-end connections to reduce leaking. That allows customers to save on both energy and maintenance costs.

"Swagelok's skill sets are in precision manufacturing," says Jim Francis, the company's vice president of human resources.

The company's special expertise was recognized in late 2006, when Swagelok, along with research collaborator Case Western Reserve University, received a three-year, $5.5-million grant from Ohio's Third Frontier initiative to research and commercialize a new method for heat-treating stainless steels to dramatically improve hardness and other performance characteristics.

"Because of Cleveland's history of precision metal fabrication and machining, we've always been able to rely on its diverse pool of talent," he says. "And the education system in Ohio has produced great engineers and business candidates."

But the learning doesn't stop when people are hired. The company hosts almost 100 classroom courses on a number of topics � including personal development, management and technical training.

Source: Jim Francis, Swagelok
Writer: Colin McEwen

With all of the gains made in advanced manufacturing, some work still can be dirty, expensive and dangerous. But a Cincinnati area company is working to make manufacturing and medical processes safer, cleaner and less costly.

Brighton Technologies Group, in St. Bernard, has developed nearly a dozen new technologies including pretreatment, coatings and films for metals and wood. They include Oleophic Thin Films that prevent oil from clogging industrial filters, Water Resistant Thin Films that protect decorative metal surface finishes and Polymer Surface Treatment for tough-to-bond materials. All are designed to be cleaner and less hazardous to workers and the environment.

Brighton was founded in 1997 as an independent research and development consulting firm, but eventually evolved to improve and develop coatings for medical and airplane parts. BTG changed course when it invented a viable high performance alternative to the toxic, hazardous, and expensive chromate metal pretreatment processes most commonly used, the company says. Recognizing the gravity of the problem, the EPA and NSF provided substantial financial support for development of BTG's technology.

In June, Brighton was awarded $748,000 in Ohio Department of Development and Ohio Third Frontier grants to bring its Surface Energy Probe, or SEP, to market. The hand-held SEP assesses a surface's readiness for coating, printing and bonding to reduce work failure and rework costs. The automobile and packaging film industries are among those excited by this new technology.

"We plan to deliver beta versions to Lockheed-Martin, Boeing and the US Air Force before the end of the year," says Eric Oseas, BTG's Chief Operating Officer.

Brighton also is developing an anti-microbial coating for medical devices aimed at reducing infections that patients acquire in hospitals.

Source: Brighton Technologies Group news and Eric Oseas, Chief Operating Officer
Writer: Feoshia Henderson