MIT announces new manufacturing plan | MIT News

MIT today launched the initiative of the New Manufacturing Program (INM), a scope effort aimed at restocking U.S. industrial production through leading technologies, strengthening key U.S. economic areas and IGNITE job creation.

The program will cover advanced research, innovative educational programs, and partnerships with companies in many fields to help transform manufacturing and increase its impact.

“We want to work with companies big and small to help them increase productivity in cities, towns and anywhere in between,” MIT President Sally A. Kornbluth wrote in a letter to the institute’s community this morning. “We want to deliberately design high-quality people-centered manufacturing to bring new lives to communities across the country.”

Kornbluth added: “Helping the future of new manufacturing in the United States is the ideal job for MIT – I firmly believe that we don’t have more important work to meet this moment and serve the country right now.”

The new manufacturing program also announced its first six founding industry consortium members: Amgen, Flextronics International, GE Vernova, PTC, Sanofi and Siemens. Participants in the INM industry consortium will support the seed project proposed by MIT researchers, which was originally made in the field of artificial intelligence.

INM joins the ranks of other presidential initiatives at MIT, including the MIT’s climate program; tin-style, supporting human-centric disciplines; MIT’s cure, life sciences and health-centric; and Mgaic, a MIT-generated AI impact consortium.

“From nanotechnology to large-scale manufacturing, as well as applications including semiconductors, medical devices, medical devices, energy systems and biotechnology, there are tremendous opportunities to bring together a vibrant community, from nanotechnology to large-scale manufacturing, including nanocatheters, Anantha Chandrakasan,” “MIT’s location is to harness the transformative power of digital tools and artificial intelligence to shape the future of manufacturing. I’m very excited about what we can build together and the synergy that this has with other cross-cutting initiatives across the institute.”

The program is just the latest MIT-centric effort in recent decades to expand U.S. manufacturing. A teacher research team wrote the 1989 bestseller, Made in the United States: Regaining Productivity, advocated renewal of manufacturing. Another MIT project called production in an innovative economy calls for expanded manufacturing in the early 2010s. In 2016, MIT also founded Engine, a venture capital investing in hardware-based “hard-tech” startups, including many companies with the potential to become a large number of manufacturing companies.

With the development of new manufacturing initiatives, the MIT initiative is based on four main themes:

• Reimagine manufacturing technologies and systems: implement breakthrough technology and system-level approaches to drive energy production, healthcare, computing, transportation, consumer products, and more;
• Improve productivity and experience in manufacturing: Develop and deploy new digitally driven methods and tools to expand productivity and improve human manufacturing experience;
• Expand new manufacturing: accelerate the size of manufacturing companies and change supply chains to maximize efficiency and resilience, foster product innovation and business growth; and
• Change the manufacturing base: Promoting the deployment of a sustainable global manufacturing ecosystem that provides workers with compelling opportunities with a focus on the United States

The initiative has mapped many specific activities and programs, including an institute research program on emerging technologies and other major topics; workforce and education programs; and industry participation and participation. INM also aims to build new laboratories for the development of manufacturing tools and technologies; a “factory observatory” program that immerse students in manufacturing by visiting production locations; and a key “pillar” focuses on areas ranging from semiconductor and biomanufacturing to defense and aviation.

INM’s workforce and educational elements will include Techamp, a program created by MIT, which works with community colleges to bridge the gap between technicians and engineers; AI-driven teaching tools; professional education; and efforts to expand manufacturing education on campus in partnership with MIT departments and degree programs.

The INM leadership team has three co-directors: John Hart, professor and head of the mechanical engineering department in 1922; political scientist Suzanne Berger, professor at the MIT School of Technology, conducted influential manufacturing experience research; and Chris Love, Raymond A. and Helen E. The executive director of the program is Julie Diop.

The initiative is the establishment of a teacher steering committee in the process of representatives from the institute as well as representatives from the external advisory committee. INM stems in part from the work of the Manufacturing @MIT Working Group, which was established in 2022 to assess many of these issues.

The launch of the new initiative was previewed at a one-day MIT workshop on May 7, titled “The Vision of New Manufacturing.” The event was held in front of a competent audience at the MIT Wong Auditorium, with speakers in more than 30 manufacturing sectors.

“The reason to develop and change American manufacturing has never been more urgent than today,” Berger said at the event. “What we are trying to build at MIT now is not just another research project. … In this room and people outside this room, we are trying to change what is going on in our country.”

“We need to consider the importance of re-manufacturing because that’s what brings product ideas to people,” Love told MIT News. “For example, in biotechnology, new life-saving drugs cannot reach patients without manufacturing. The real urgency of these two issues is the real urgency of economic prosperity and job creation. When we lose leadership in manufacturing in certain sectors, we have seen the impact on our country. Biotechnology leaders, we have promoted new strengths over 40 years of scope, but we need to promote new economic development here, but we can promote new leaders here, but we can promote new leaders here, but we can promote our leadership in this area.”

Hart added: “While manufacturing feels very timely today, it has lasting importance. Making products makes our daily lives and manufacturing crucial to advancing the forefront of technology and society. Our efforts to launch this initiative in the effort to initiate this program have sparked excitement for MIT’s manufacturing industry, which reveals the creation of innovative tools from students, especially with small companies and industrial manufacturing from small companies, and from small companies, and the creation of emerging tools for new manufacturers to create creative tools.

Kornbluth stressed in his letter to the MIT community today that the goal of the program is to drive transformation by making manufacturing more productive, resilient and sustainable.

“We want to reimagine manufacturing technologies and systems to advance areas such as energy production, healthcare, computing, transportation, consumer goods,” she wrote. “We want to go far beyond the ground of the store to deal with how to make supply chains more resilient and how to inform public policy to promote a broad, healthy manufacturing ecosystem that can drive decades of innovation and growth.”