From Manufacturing Dive, June 30:
U.S. manufacturing is in ‘pretty bad shape.’ MIT hopes to change that.The Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Initiative for New Manufacturing is partnering with Siemens, GE Vernova and others to boost productivity through technology and innovation.
U.S. manufacturing is in a rebuilding phase. Following decades of productivity slowdowns fueled by labor declines and globalization, companies are leveraging artificial intelligence and automation to fill in the gaps and attract the next generation of workers.
However, the vast majority of manufacturers in the small to medium-sized tier are struggling to evolve, according to academics. In Cleveland, Ohio, for example, metalworkers today are still using the same milling machines used in the 1940s, said Suzanne Berger, a political science professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and co-director of the university’s Initiative for New Manufacturing.
There are no robots. There are no 3D printers. Instead, metal fabricators are looking for people who can operate the equipment they have at a wage of $13 per hour, Berger said — “unless an Amazon warehouse down the street opens up, then [they’ll] have to pay $15 an hour.”
Over the past 20 years, Berger, alongside her colleagues and students, have traveled to factories around the world, interviewing manufacturers about their operations and workforces, and found that U.S. companies are not as technologically competitive as hoped, but rather stuck in a “low-end trap.”
“We have low tech, low skill, low wages, low productivity, and you can’t really fix any one of these pieces without trying to really pull this ‘knot’ apart,” she said. “And, the question is, how do we do that?”
Recently, MIT launched its Initiative for New Manufacturing, an institute-wide effort to reinfuse U.S. industrial production with the latest technologies to bolster economic sectors and ignite job creation.
Through a mix of research, hands-on training and collaboration with corporate partners, the Cambridge, Massachusetts, university plans to build the tools and talent to shape a more productive and sustainable future for manufacturing.
“We want to work with firms big and small … in cities, and small towns, and everywhere in between … to help them adopt new approaches for increased productivity,” MIT President Sally Kornbluth said during a May 7 speech about the initiative.
The first seven consortium member companies involved with the initiative are Amgen, Autodesk, Flex, GE Vernova, PTC, Sanofi and Siemens. They will initially support seed projects related to AI in manufacturing, with plans to expand into other topics, according to a news release. Each company has agreed to provide $1.5 million over a three-year period as part of the initiative, an MIT spokesperson said....
....MUCH MORE
Interesting that GEV and Siemens are collaborating in that GE Vernova is the largest steam (electricity generation) turbine manufacturer in the world and Siemens is either #2 or #3, depending on who is counting.
As noted introducing June 15's "Electricity: "Report Says 130 New Gas-Fired Power Projects Proposed in Texas" (GEV)":
If all these proposals go forward GE Vernova would probably have to buy Siemens' gas turbine business just to keep the backlog to fifteen years or less.
For what it's worth GE Vernova's stock hit an all-time high this morning ($545.63) and has more than tripled since it was spun out of General Electric. $541.26 last, up $11.26 (+2.12%)
