NextFlex Announces Partnership with California Manufacturing Technology Consulting to Help Small- and Medium-Size Manufacturers

CMTC Selected by NIST for Manufacturing Extension Partnership Project Award to Embed Staff at NextFlex

San Jose, Calif.—NextFlex, America’s Flexible Hybrid Electronics (FHE) Manufacturing Innovation Institute, today announced it has partnered with California Manufacturing Technology Consulting (CMTC), a Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) center in Torrance, Calif., which has been awarded a grant by the U.S. Commerce Department’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to help small- and medium-sized manufacturers.

Shedding more light on the project, NextFlex Director of Commercialization, Paul Semenza, noted, “We’re looking to develop approaches for engaging small manufacturers with NextFlex through hands-on assistance and services, and cultivate an enhanced nationwide network of partnerships among NextFlex and MEP centers. We are excited and honored to partner with CMTC on this important project and will work closely with them, and MEP centers in Indiana and Georgia, to develop programs that enable small manufacturers to adopt FHE technologies, and benefit from NextFlex activities.”

Jim Watson, President & CEO, CMTC, added, “We are looking forward to our partnership with NextFlex and fostering the integration of small- and medium-sized manufacturers, who account for more than 99% of establishments nationwide, into the Institute.”

About Flexible Hybrid Electronics
FHE combines the ability to add electronics to new and unique materials that are part of our everyday lives, with the power of silicon ICs to create lightweight, low-cost, flexible, conformable and stretchable smart products to solve new problems and advance the efficiency of our world. Once in full production, FHE will usher in a new era of “electronics on everything.” Intelligence will be taken out of the “boxes” or packages associated with traditional electronics like PCs, smartphones and tablets, and transplanted directly onto a variety of surfaces including the human body, enabling an entirely new breed of defense and commercial applications we haven’t imagined.

But to develop these enabling FHEs, new manufacturing solutions are required and they come with significant integration challenges. Working alone, it would take years, perhaps decades, and unprecedented amounts of capital for a company to create the infrastructure to support mass production of FHEs. NextFlex, along with its members, is working to rapidly uncover and solve the complex manufacturing issues associated with production of flexible hybrid electronics, and ultimately create a manufacturing infrastructure that can efficiently be spun out to private industry.

About NextFlex
NextFlex was founded on August 28, 2015, through the execution of a Cooperative Agreement between the U.S. Department of Defense and FlexTech Alliance. A public-private partnership, NextFlex is the seventh Manufacturing Innovation Institute funded through Manufacturing USA to create, showcase, and deploy new capabilities and new manufacturing processes. More information about NextFlex, can be found at www.nextflex.us.

About CMTC
CMTC, a private non-profit corporation, was established in 1992 to provide consulting services to small and mid-size manufacturers in California. CMTC operates through a cooperative agreement between the Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) under the Department of Commerce.