Manufacturing & Technology News articles from May 2005

Manufacturing & Technology News archives from May 2005

Science advisor defends Bush record on R&D, but criticism lingers.
May 6, 2005... Key Republican House members are stepping forward with concerns over federal research funding levels, apparently undeterred by a recent signal from Presidential Science Adviser John Marburger that the administration's defense of its 2006...

Budget cuts lead to layoffs of physicists at National Labs.
May 6, 2005... A minimum of 270 employees are expected to leave Brookhaven National Laboratory, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) as a result of force...

IT deployment will shake up wholesale distribution industry.
May 6, 2005... The wholesale-distribution industry is undergoing sweeping changes, as companies transition from being low-margin "box movers" to providing value-added services to their customers, according to the National Association of...

AIA's student rocket competition is a growing success.
May 6, 2005... The Aerospace Industries Association's two-year-old model rocket contest for students in middle and high school has become "overwhelmingly" popularly. This year, 712 teams from 49 states, the District of Columbia and Germany participated in the...

Shipbuilding R&D Program funds seven new projects.
May 6, 2005... The National Shipbuilding Research Program, a collaboration of 11 U.S. shipyards working with the government and academia, has awarded seven new research projects valued at $13.4 million. The projects include improving shipyard product data...

High tech is no longer an engine of job creation.
May 6, 2005... Employment in the high-tech sector of the U.S. economy continued its downward drift last year, according to the American Electronics Association's annual "Cyberstates" report. Total high-tech employment fell by 25,300 last year. The year...

A congressional leader emerges on science & technology issues.
May 6, 2005... From his perch as chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Science, State, Justice & Commerce, Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) sees the U.S. "falling behind" in the high-stakes race for world leadership in innovation. It's a...

Wind power forecast gets revised upward.
May 6, 2005... The U.S. wind energy industry this year is expected to "shatter" the previous record for the installation of new capacity, according to an updated market outlook from the American Wind Energy Association. The trade group increased its 2005...

Wolf to Bush: 'alarming' trends must be reversed.
May 6, 2005... Rep. Frank Wolf (D-Va.), is considered to be one of the House of Representatives' "Cardinals" because he is chairman of one of the powerful appropriations subcommittees. Of late, he has been reading the numerous reports being produced about the...

Industrial survival strategies: emulate successful companies and get in front of trends.(INTERVIEW: CLIFF RANSOM)(Interview)
May 6, 2005... There are not too many financial analysts following the heavy industrial sectors of the economy that base their recommendations on whether a company has embraced a lean approach to its operations. But there is one: Cliff Ransom, well-known in...

China's consumption of machine tools almost doubles that of the United States.
May 6, 2005... Consumption of machine tools in China last year set a new world record. Chinese consumption increased by 37 percent in 2004, to $9.26 billion, almost double the amount consumed in the United States ($4.9 billion), according to the annual tally...

Lean certification program planned for manufacturing professionals.
May 6, 2005... Three manufacturing organizations are teaming up to create a new set of standards for certifying lean practitioners. The Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME), the Association for Manufacturing Excellence (AME) and the Shingo Prize for...

Upcoming events.(Calendar)
May 6, 2005... May 9-11 24th Conference on Properties and Applications of Magnetic Materials, Chicago, Ill. Sponsored by the Illinois Institute of Technology, http://magnetic.iit.edu. May 10-11 10th Annual Science, Engineering and Technology...

Big changes descending upon Commerce Department's technology administration.
May 6, 2005... Phil Bond will be leaving the post of Under Secretary of Commerce for Technology, which he has occupied since 2001, at the end of next week. Considering the proposed budget cut of 35 percent now hanging over the office he has headed, there may...

ASME seeks government relations representative.
May 6, 2005... The American Society of Mechanical Engineers is looking for a new government relations representative for its Washington, D.C., office. If you're interested in applying or know of somebody good to lobby for better government policies related to...

ANSI seeks nominations for IP Policy Committee.
May 6, 2005... The American National Standards Institute is seeking members for its newly created Intellectual Property Rights Policy Committee. ANSI is boosting its activities around patents and copyrights and will begin developing new standards for embedded...

New member is added to U.S.-China Commission.
May 6, 2005... The United States-China Economic and Security Review Commission has a new commissioner: Thomas Donnelly, a resident fellow in defense and security policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute. Donnelly, who was appointed by Sen. Majority...

NSF budget request letter garners widespread support.
May 6, 2005... Reps. Vernon Ehlers (R-Mich.) and Rush Holt (D-N.J.) had garnered the signatures of 167 House colleagues by mid-week on a letter requesting that appropriators provide the National Science Foundation (NSF) with $6.1 billion in Fiscal Year 2006,...

Senate majority favors reversal of DOE science budget cuts.
May 6, 2005... A veto-proof majority of Senators called this week for the reversal of budget cuts targeted for the Department of Energy's Office of Science under the administration's proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2006. In a letter to Sens. Pete...

DARPA director goes on the offensive in defending his record & his agency.(Clash Of Titans)
May 20, 2005... The director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) testily confronted two important leaders at a House Science Committee hearing, declaring that the computer science community is misinformed about what's happening at his...

Restoring U.S. competitiveness is subject of government summit.
May 20, 2005... Declaring that "the time has come to sound the alarm" over the United States' lagging performance in science and innovation, Rep. Frank Wolf (RVa.) announced last week that a "National Conference on Science, Innovation and Manufacturing" is to...

Congressional appropriation shuffle does not alleviate budgetary pressures.
May 20, 2005... The former House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, State and the Judiciary has a new name and a new purview for the 109th Congress. But its members are faced with the same old dilemma: too much to fund and too little money to...

Help wanted: president of new manufacturing trade group.
May 20, 2005... The recently created American Small Manufacturers Coalition in Washington is looking for its first president and CEO. The group, the follow-on organization to the Michigan-based Modernization Forum, represents manufacturing extension centers...

China's industrial growth changes global energy equation.
May 20, 2005... Demand for energy in China is marching forward at a staggering pace and will have widespread repercussions for the global economy, security and the environment, according to speakers at a recent event sponsored by the Center for Strategic and...

Manufacturing legislation jumps the same hurdle it jumped last year.
May 20, 2005... The House Science Committee is sending to the floor an authorization bill for the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) that would more than double the sums requested for the Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP), but in...

Mfg. job growth forecast for India.
May 20, 2005... The Indian manufacturing sector should create 25 million new jobs by 2009, and manufactured exports should increase from $50 billion to $100 billion, according to India's Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry (ASSOCHAM). "Global trends...

Bush team does not think much of technology policy.
May 20, 2005... The Department of Commerce's Technology Administration (TA), facing a proposed 35 percent budget cut in Fiscal Year 2006, appears to be in for a fundamental reshaping of its functions as well as a reduction in size, DOC officials and budget...

Enervating the Commerce Department's Technology Administration is 'astounding'.
May 20, 2005... Two former heads of the Commerce Department's Technology Administration (TA) who reviewed the bureau's budget documents for fiscal years 2005 and 2006 at the request of Manufacturing & Technology News reacted strongly--and negatively--to the...

FERC issues new rule for small generators.
May 20, 2005... The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has issued a new rule that allows electrical generators smaller than 20 megawatts to be connected to the grid. FERC Order Number 2006 "removes barriers to the development of needed infrastructure by...

Aviation group raises alarm flags.
May 20, 2005... The U.S. civil aviation industry has fallen out of the leadership position in the world, says a new report from the National Institute of Aerospace. "The centroid of aviation technical and market leadership is shifting outside the United States...