GRAND RAPIDS, MI-- Firstronic has been awarded state grant worth nearly $300,000 to train workers hired in part with funds from an earlier grant, the EMS company said today. The $289,550 Skilled Trades Training Funds grant from Michigan’s Workforce Development Agency comes on the heels of a $300,000 state grant awarded in September to help the contract assembler fund additional hiring driven by strong business growth.

"Part of the reason we are so successful in our ‘Made in USA’ value proposition is that we have gotten strong state support as we have needed to add resources," said John Sammut, Firstronic CEO. "This is a true win-win partnership. We’ve already added 80 of the 110 people we committed to hire over a three-year period when we were awarded the earlier grant. This second grant ensures that we have additional funding to provide training. The end result is that we are helping Michigan add jobs and they are ensuring that we end up with a highly trained workforce during this period of rapid expansion.”

The majority of the funding will be used to ensure new employees are trained through Firstronic’s comprehensive internal training program, which includes training to J-STD-001, IPC-A-610 and IPC 7711/7722 standards. Some funding will also provide educational reimbursement to employees taking courses at local technical schools and colleges.

"Using a mix of in-house and industry standard training programs, we are able to move from entry level to highly skilled workers in three-to-six months," Sammut said. "We also cross-train employees to do multiple jobs, plus provide training on Lean manufacturing principles and continuous improvement methodologies. This helps us be more responsive to customer changes in demand, because we can easily redeploy our team in the operations most critical to the required production. This ability to flex our force and achieve higher levels of productivity is the reason we are able to compete so effectively in the global marketplace. Nearly 75% of our production is exported to Mexico, Korea, China or India. Our customers recognize the value of a highly trained team.”

• Prev
• Next