Dayton/West Central Ohio : Innovation + Job News

Need a prefab bridge that you can drop over a small stream? Dayton-based Composite Advantage just might be able to fix you up.

Founded in 2005 as a spinoff of the National Composite Center, the company is making its way in the world using composite materials to replace old standbys like steel, wood and concrete.

Bridge decks. Drop-in-place portable bridges. Structural panels. Concrete forms. Pads to give cranes and other heavy equipment a stable surface. The list goes on.

In most cases, says company President, Scott Reeve, "they are fiberglass reinforcement with a polyester or vinylester resin. They're durable and corrosion resistant and can stand up to any environment."

Reeve says the company has benefited from market development projects through the Dayton Development Coalition as part of the Ohio Third Frontier's Entrepreneurial Signature Program. Starting with two employees in 2005, "we have grown to where we generally run with a basic workforce of 16 people. We have peak times where we will add another 10 people on a temporary basis."

The company's big focus at the moment is a composite mat now being used by Canadian Mat Systems to provide "big flat panels that become temporary roadways, work surfaces. When they go in and are going to drill for oil, they need a big work space around big oil rigs. The main advantages are corrosion resistance, lighter weight, they're stronger and don't take as long to install."

Reeve says the company grew in 2007 and 2008 and held steady in 2009. But he looks for more growth in the future as it introduces new products.

Source: Scott Reeve, Composite Advantage
Writer: Gene Monteith

Performance Polymer Solutions, Inc. is embroiled in a sticky business -- high-temperature reinforced polymer materials used for  adhesive, resin and fiber molding products.

These days, the company is attracting plenty of attention from government and others who see the value of materials that can work at extreme temperature (600 degrees), a requirement for aviation and aerospace applications.

Based in Moraine, P2SI's products are part of the production of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and are also well suited for missiles, space systems, electronics, off-shore drilling, and optical devices, says Jason Lincoln, vice president and co-founder.

The company was started in 2002 by Lincoln and David Curliss, who formerly worked on similar technology with the U.S. Air Force. P2SI recently received a Third Frontier Grant of $350,000 to expand its production.

Over the past six years, P2SI has received numerous Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer  grants through the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Navy and the Office of the Secretary of Defense to develop its specialized materials. At least 75 percent of the company's business is related to military uses, says Lincoln.

In addition to high temperature adhesives, resins and prepags, P2SI offers high-temperature composite parts manufacturing, manufacturing support, contracted research and development and testing and analysis.

The company currently employs people 14 full time, but over the next three years Lincoln says P2SI will be adding three to five new employees in manufacturing and marketing as it ramps up production to meet higher demand.

Source: Jason Lincoln, Performance Polymer Solutions
Writer: Val Prevish

When industries and academians tackle tough problems, they often look to their own experience for answers. Ditto the military. If the TecEdge Innovation and Collaboration Center has its way, solutions will come not from silos, but from working together in cross-functional teams.

TecEdge and its sister organization, TecEdge Works Rapid Prototyping Laboratory, are part of the Wright Brothers Institute in Dayton. Recently relocated into bright new space next to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, TecEdge is hoping to break down barriers.

One way is through Discovery Forums, which are one- to- five day problem oriented sessions that bring together experts from diverse disciplines, says Wright Institute Director Les McFawn. Another is Resident Teams, which work at TecEdge for weeks or months -- or in some cases full time -- to intensely collaborate on problems, to experiment and to reach the initial stages of prototyping.

McFawn says it's not just the Air Force that benefits from the programs; "We had a commercial and industry partner on the very first project that we ran in the Discovery Lab. At the conclusion of the program were able to take what they had learned and apply it commercially."

In the meantime, both the Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) and TecEdge have teamed up to help develop the next generation of scientists and engineers, McFawn says. Summer at the Edge began three years ago with 15 students ranging from high school through Ph.D. Enrollment grew to more than 60 last summer. The AFRL is also sponsoring a new program called Wright Scholars in which students from the Dayton area spend time learning about technology needed for the future.

Source: Les McFawn, Wright Brothers Institute
Writer: Gene Monteith

Innova once made the delivery boxes that kept your pizza warm. Today, it's developing systems designed to keep the heat off of American military personnel.

Formed in 1994 as the offspring of CJ Laser Corp., Innova has its hands in numerous high-tech applications based on its expertise in lasers and other photonics applications.

Innova President Nilesen Gokay and her husband, Cem Gokay -- the firm's executive vice president -- say their relationship with researchers at the University of Dayton, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and a number of startup companies in the instruments- controls-and electronics industry has powered the firm's growth.

"We have a 7,000 square foot facility, and its going to grow to a 11,000-square-foot facility," says Cem Gokay. "(A year ago), we had five employees; now we have 17."

Innova is working with companies like FLIR Systems, which makes thermal imaging cameras, and Carl Zeiss Inc., which makes advanced optical lenses, to build systems needed for stabilized gimbals -- technology used in the noses of aircraft or ships to home in on military targets. Innova is also working with fellow Daytonian STAN Solutions to add capabilities to a mega-pixel camera STAN is refining for military applications.

Yet, the Gokays describe their main goal during the past two years as working to bring in larger defense companies to the Dayton region -- and lay groundwork for additional training capabilities for the industry.

Those efforts have led to Portland, Ore.,-based FLIR establishing a sales office in the community as a precursor to setting up production operations, says Cem Gokay. He says similar efforts are under way with Zeiss, and that "we hope that by end of 2010 we will be in the manufacturing phase with both."

Sources: Nilesen and Cem Gokay, Innova
Writer: Gene Monteith

Art Fritts says the market for nanomaterials wasn't completely clear when he launched his fledging company in 2004.

Luckily for Fritts and NanoSperse, the value has become crystal clear since then. In July, the Dayton-based firm moved from production space at the University of Dayton Research Institute (UDRI) to an 8,000-square-foot production facility at the National Composite Center in Kettering. Production capacity? A million pounds of material per year.

The move has prompted an increase in payroll, too. The company, which ended 2009 with two employees, now has eight and is expected to at least double that number within the next two years, says Fritts, NanoSperse's president.

NanoSperse has made its way commercializing a unique method of distributing nano-size carbon particles throughout materials to improve durability, reliability and functionality of composites for the defense, aerospace, and industrial marketplaces. The technology was developed at the University of Dayton, and Fritts -- with 30 years in the polymer industry -- started NanoSperse to commercialize it.

Fritz says that material is tailor-made for a desert environment by becoming the actual surface of the part, eliminating the need for more traditional coatings. He adds that the composite can be expected to hold up three to five times longer than traditional coatings. The company is now producing the material for aerospace uses and shipped its first big order in July.

Fritts says the relationship with UDRI was a godsend for the young company because it allowed NanoSperse to fill orders immediately while learning how to scale production to bigger orders -- and to work with cross industry teams as part of the Ohio Third Frontier's Research Commercialization Program.

Source: Art Fritts, NanoSperse
Writer: Gene Monteith

Like many start ups, Dayton's Applied Optimization Inc. was a case of smart folks deciding to work for themselves.

"I always worked very, very long hours, and was never home. So my wife said If you're going to work this much, you should start your own business," says company founder and Principal Scientist Anil Chaudhary, an MIT grad.

Chaudhary left a job in Air Force-related research to launch Applied Optimization in 1995. The specialized company uses computational mathematics to develop new generation manufacturing processes for the aerospace and manufacturing industries, eliminating trial and error. These new processes can reduce manufacturing costs while increasing efficiency. Clients include the Air Force Research Laboratory, Boeing and Edison Welding Institute.

A more off-the-beaten-path application for the company's mathematical wizardry is in space sciences. Tamara Payne, the company's principal scientist, noted in December that the company has catalogued 36,000 pieces of space junk that can now be tracked in a less expensive and more timely manner.

The company has 11 full- and part-time employees, including three who were hired last year. Chaudhary says the company's move into the Dayton Entrepreneur Center in 2002 has helped it grow.

"The ability to speak with people in the corridor who have similar problems is very helpful. Also there are support services that are provided; if I have a question they will point me to right person," Chaudhary says.

"The federal customers and Air Force base are here in Dayton, and those were important factors. But the support that is here in the city for this kind of work is very encouraging and positive," he says.

Source: Anil Chaudhary and Tamara Payne, Applied Optimization
Writer: Feoshia Henderson and Gene Monteith

Born out of tragedy, Dayton-based STAN Solutions believes the work it's doing will lessen the chances of similar incidents in the future.

"Stan Harriman was a friend of my brother's," explains J. Tony Manuel, president of the Dayton company that now bears Harriman's name. "He was on patrol in Afghanistan with my brother. There was an insurgency in the area, and an air strike was called in to provide assistance. They saw my brother, but they didn't see Stan."

Manuel said the loss spurred Chris Manuel to ask Tony if something could be done to prevent friendly-fire casualties in the future.

Manuel, a former engineering instructor at Sinclair Community College, launched STAN Solutions in 2002 to do just that, starting with three questions that have dogged militaries for centuries: Where am I? Where are my buddies? And where is the enemy?

Today, the answers are coming for the first time using a real-time network using video, data and text -- a system that now allows military personnel in places like Afghanistan and Iraq lessen friendly-fire casualties and civilian deaths.

Meanwhile, the company has continued to branch out into new network capabilities and sensor technologies that show promise in both military and civilian applications. STAN currently has the sole licensing rights to a super-camera developed by Israel-based Adaptive Imaging Technologies. STAN is making refinements to the instrument's capabilities to provide 360-degree giga-pixel resolution from 6.5 miles away, Manuel says. The camera has potential not just for the military uses, he says, but for such things as spotting the cause of smoke in a forest or allowing a rural doctor to transmit crucial medical images to a specialist.

The company currently employs about 50, Manuel says, but continues to grow.

Source: J. Tony Manuel, STAN Solutions
Writer: Gene Monteith

The pieces are beginning to fall into place as Dayton prepares to leverage its recent designation as Ohio's Aerospace Hub.

In September, Gov. Ted Strickland and Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher announced the first of what could be as many as a dozen Ohio Hubs of Innovation and Opportunity that promote urban revitalization and sustainable regional growth.

Dayton's selection is expected to create new companies, strengthen existing partnerships and attract new investment based on Ohio's research, development, and industry assets, including The University of Dayton and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.

Since September, a board representing five major partners --- the University of Dayton, the City of Dayton, Montgomery County, the Citywide Development Corporation and the Dayton Development Coalition -- has been laying the groundwork for development of a strategic plan that will guide efforts going forward.

While UD serves as lead partner, "it wouldn't be possible without the critical role of the other partners," says John Leland, director of the UD's Research Institute.

Adam Murka, communications director for the Dayton Development Coalition, notes that "Dayton achieved this designation because of how well folks in this region are working together. They really buy in, and that's very exciting."

Mickey McCabe, Vice President of Research and the UDRI's executive director adds that the hub designation is aimed not just at developing business partnerships, but an infrastructure of both business and quality-of-life components that "create a place where people can work, live, eat and play."

McCabe and Leland say a strategic board is starting to come together, after which an executive director will be hired and work on a strategic plan begun. While the hub begins work with $250,000 provided by the state, at least three times that will be needed for the first three years. Leland says the balance will be raised by the five partners.

Sources: Mickey McCabe and John Leland, University of Dayton; Adam Murka, Dayton Development Coalition
Writer: Gene Monteith

In the middle of Preble County, surrounded by the small town of Eaton and the cornfields beyond, stands an anomaly: Silfex. An anomaly because, as one of only a handful of U.S.-based companies that grow silicon crystals, you might not expect to find it here.

Yet, Silfex has managed to grab more than half the world-wide market for custom silicon parts used in machines that make memory and logic components -- at the same time other U.S.-based companies have found the required investment too daunting or been content to leave the business to foreign firms, says Michael Snell, general manager.

Silfex, a division of Lam Research Corp., started life in 1971 as Bullen Ultrasonics, a family-run business that specialized in ultrasonic machining technologies. In 1999, silicon crystal manufacturing was added. In 2006, Fremont, Calif.-based Lam Research Corp. -- one of Bullen's major customers -- purchased the company's silicon-growing and fabrication operations.

Silfex recently completed a large expansion of its silicon-growing operations and enhanced its capabilities for bonding, cleaning and clean room manufacturing. It employs some 250 in Eaton and another 50 at a sister plant in China, Snell says.

Snell says there are lots of good reasons to keep Silfex in Eaton, including the fact that "when you get to be this size, it's extremely costly to move. But our workforce is also an advantage. We have the experience and the work ethic in this area that we need."

He says the fact that Ohio has enjoyed relatively low electricity costs is another advantage. The silicon furnaces used to melt raw material and grow silicon into large, glassy crystals use megawatts of electricity -- so much that Snell says Dayton Power and Light plans to build a substation nearby.

Source: Michael Snell, Silfex
Writer: Gene Monteith

Besse Medical Supply in West Chester has accomplished what many small, family-run startups dream of: becoming part of a Fortune 26 company while holding onto family tradition.

Besse Medical Supply started out as a Cincinnati corner pharmacy in 1948, eventually growing into a business supplying medical products to local physicians. Today, as a division of the  AmerisourceBergen Specialty Group, part of the Fortune 26  AmerisourceBergen Corp., Besse Medical Supply continues that business model on a larger scale.

Besse is one of the nation's leading distributors of vaccines and biologicals, brand name and generic injectables and pharmaceuticals, diagnostic test kits, surgical supplies and more. Customers include physician's offices, specialty groups, clinics, occupational health facilities and health departments.

Besse employs 100 in West Chester, most in customer service, and has a shared distribution center in Louisville, Ky.

Mick Besse, company president and general manager, credits Besse's investment in technology � assuring that products get where they need to go, quickly and safely � and commitment to customers among its reasons for success. Much of the business has gone online, Besse said.

"Our investment in technology has gone to improving service to our customers, to support our vision of being partner to our healthcare providers and manufacturing partners," Besse said.

Source: Mick Besse, Besse Medical Supply
Writer: Feoshia Henderson

Aerospace companies with a colorful history are a dime a dozen. Aerospace companies with a tie to Orville Wright are something special.
 
Hartzell Propeller is the latter.

The company 's roots reach back to 1875, when John T. Hartzell founded a sawmill in Greenville, Ohio. The wood business took an upswing in 1917 when, amidst a growing airplane manufacturing industry, Hartzell's son, Robert, founded a wooden propeller blade business at his father's sawmill company, says Michael Disbrow, Hartzell senior vice president.

"The legend is that Orville Wright suggested the company start making wooden airplane blades," Disbrow says. "It had to do with a relationship with Orville Wright, who lived in Oakwood, two doors down (from Robert)."

While the fledging Hartzell Propeller never made blades directly for Orville Wright machines, the company did become an early supplier to the Dayton Wright Airplane Company, which purchased Wright's company when Orville left to pursue other interests.

Today, Hartzell seems worlds away from the early days of flight. Now headquartered in Piqua with 275 employees, Hartzell is a market leader in supplying both metal and lightweight composite blades for private and corporate aircraft.

Hartzell's website lists a fistful of firsts: the first composite blades in the 1940s; the first reversible blades, also in the '40s; the first full-feathering blades in the 1950s; the first practical turboprop blades in the 1960s.

In 1986, Hartzell manufactured the aluminum props that powered Burt Rutan's historic non-stop circumnavigation of the globe.

While Disbrow says the company was one of the pioneers in development of lightweight composite blades, "most of our props are still made from forged aluminum."

Customers include Hawker Beechcraft, Piper, Air Tractor and a number of others.

Source: Michael Disbrow, Hartzell Propeller
Writer: Gene Monteith

Jack Berlekamp is an idea guy. A former marketer, he took knowledge garnered as a contractor for the armed forces, where workers handled specialized electronic instruments out in the field.

Those instruments, which tested or measured equipment on large vehicles or airplanes, were cumbersome and often failed in bad weather. For more than a decade Berlekamp worked to understand how to make life easier for these men and women in uniform. And in 2005, he founded Pallas Systems, LLC, an advanced logistics tool provider.

He started the company out of his Delaware County basement in 2005, with the help of some talented Ohio engineers who could make reality his idea. They created a rugged, multi-functional tool that streamlined tasks.

"Most of the time, when you go out in the field, each instrument has single function, and you have multiple boxes that you take out. We created a ruggedized instrument and its software is programmable. It can change its personality and add function based on what field service is doing," he said.

Berlekamp moved his company from Columbus to Springfield to be near the opportunities afforded by being located near Wright-Patterson Air Force Base . He's currently in Springfield's National Environmental Technology Incubator where he moved the company earlier this year. He has four contract engineers he plans to make full-time employees early next year, with the help of an Ohio Third Frontier Innovation loan.

"Because of the defense focus I recognized I needed to be more involved in the Dayton area. I moved my company to a part of Ohio better able to support the technology," he said. "You have to be a little flexible to be able to tap into those levels of expertise."

Source: Jack Berlekamp, founder Pallas Systems
Writer: Feoshia Henderson

A Dayton software company is taking a new tack on an age-old problem for colleges: how to keep students on track for graduation.
StudentZen, a web-based business founded less than a year ago by partners Marcus Milligan and Afshin Ghafouri, allows college counselors track their school's academically at-risk students and help them stay on course to get their degree.

"It's both a safety net and a compass for when you first get on campus," explains Milligan, president of StudentZen. Not only does it track students' progress in the classroom, but also help college counselors keep an eye on off-campus distractions, he adds. "(Students) don't have to be alone in trying to figure out how to overcome these issues."

The company's program, RetentionZen, features a suite of tools including a case management system, an early alert system that lets college instructors provide input, and counseling journals and goals programs that keep track of the student's progress. In all, it cuts down on a deluge of paperwork while allowing counselors more time to spend in one-on-one with students seeking help.

The program was developed six years ago at Sinclair Community College in Dayton, where it proved an early success in increasing the school's student retention and graduation rate, while raising student GPAs.

Early this year, Milligan, a former Sinclair staffer, and Ghafouri, an IT entrepreneur, persuaded the school to let them take the program into the commercial ring with funding help from the Ohio Third Frontier Entrepreneurial Signature Program through the Dayton Development Coalition.

Since February, the company has signed up nine community college systems, including the Lone Star and Austin Community college systems in Texas, the 10th- and 15th-largest systems in the country. Closer to home, another customer is North Central State College in Mansfield, which reports that the tool has driven annual student contacts from 300-500 in the past to more than 15,000 this year.

Sources: Marcus Milligan, StudentZen, and Beverly Walker, North Central State College
Writer: Dave Malaska

The United States is awash in water, but our capacity for storing surface water and the demands on it are growing. In fact, 36 states anticipate shortages in localities, regions, or statewide in the next 10 years, according to the U.S. Accountability Office.

While that's bad news for states like Colorado and Texas, the Dayton region sees an opportunity. Sitting on top of one of the largest clean aquifers in the nation, those who market the region are preparing to lure new companies to the area with the promise of 1.5 trillion gallons of H2O.

"We don't have mountains, we don't have oceans, but boy we have water," says Maureen Patterson, vice president of stakeholder relations for the Dayton Development Coalition. "We're seeking responsible water users, like data centers, chip manufacturers, food wholesalers," Patterson says. "Or brewers, or bottlers."

In April, the Coalition placed an ad in the Wall Street Journal as the first volley in its H2Open for Business campaign touting the region's water resources. Subsequently, the coalition sent a bottle of Dayton-area water to site selection officials across the country.

After the first of the year, the coalition will begin distributing marketing materials to site selectors and companies that might be tempted by an almost unquenchable resource. Patterson says the Water Innovations Alliance will hold a convention in Dayton in May. Backed by IBM and Intel -- which Patterson says is "the number one user of water" -- the conference is a perfect forum to highlight Dayton water, she says.

"This is a clean, buried, valley aquifer. You don't have to purify it. And it also remains a constant 56 degrees -- that's perfect for geothermal heating and cooling."

Source: Maureen Patterson, Dayton Development Coalition
Writer: Gene Monteith

Imagine the typical American teenager. He or she is wearing a t-shirt that bears the image of a celebrity and may be chewing fruit-flavored gum or printing photos from a home computer.

That image makes Ibrahim Katampe and Emmanual Itapson very happy, because it personifies their dream for Iya Technologies.

"We can become a part of every facet of life," says Itapson.

The men, CEO and senior vice president, respectively, of the Dayton-area company, are responsible for heat-transfer papers (to put pictures on fabric), microencapsulation of things like flavors in gum, and photo imaging papers. "We are a technology company that specializes in product development, providing solutions," says Katampe.

The patented heat transfer paper technology has been licensed to a Fortune 500 company. Though Katampe said Iya has agreed not to disclose the name of that company, he said Iya's innovations are in products sold under that company's name in office supply and craft stores across the U.S.

Since its formation in July, 2004, Iya has grown from one employee to 10, with more expected. Katampe expects the specialty papers and microencapsulation businesses will expand greatly. Soon, the company will move from Kettering to The Mound Advanced Technology Center in Miamisburg.

One thing's for sure. Iya will remain in Ohio. Itapson says support from economic development programs conducted by the state, Montgomery County, and Dayton has won their loyalty. "All the businesses in the area support and embrace us. If our experience is a measuring stick, as many other entrepreneurs as possible should move to Ohio," he says. "We would shout it from the rooftops."

Sources: Ibrahim Katampe and Emmanual Itapson, Iya Technologies
Writer: Gabriella Jacobs