LAS VEGAS – In his first public address, the new chief manufacturing officer for the National Institute of Standards and Technology stressed new tax and business policies are at the heart of the reinvention of US manufacturing.

Michael Molnar told the an audience at the inaugural Interactive Manufacturing Experience (imX) industry summit that the US is losing leadership not just in low-tech, low-cost manufacturing industries but also in the high-tech sector. He asserted the US now lags competitors in developing a skilled workforce and attracting the essential R&D base that leads to future innovation and growth.

Molnar said NIST supports President Barack Obama’s recently unveiled US Advanced Manufacturing Partnership, which pledges support for applied research programs in key sectors and investment in shared technology infrastructure that would help US companies improve their manufacturing.

Among his recommendations are the creation of a federally managed partnership among government, academia and industry; reforms to US corporate tax policy; an extension of the R&D tax credit (which would also be increased to 17%); and a new emphasis on science and math at lower levels of education. According to the US Department of Commerce, the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership demonstrates President Obama’s commitment to “building domestic manufacturing capabilities to create the new products, new industries and new jobs of the future.”

NIST has budgeted $120 million to improve manufacturing energy efficiency and $70 million to develop advanced robots to help automation. It has also pledged $12 million in the next fiscal year toward the start of an advanced manufacturing technology consortium, which would create partnerships that could tackle common technological barriers to new product development.

Supporting NIST’s priorities are some 2,800 staffers and an annual budget of $750 million.

For the full presentation, click here: http://www.nist.gov/director/speeches/loader.cfm?csModule=security/getfile&pageid=2647628.

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