By: Tim Cassidy, Mercury News When Apple moves the manufacturing of some Macs to the United States next year, the company obviously should put the factory in the Bay Area. It’s a no-brainer. What’s that you say? I’m the one with no brain? Look, Silicon Valley is in Apple’s DNA. It’s the company’s birthplace. It’s where Steve Jobs in 1984 famously launched the first Mac factory, a plant in Fremont he helped design to spit out one Macintosh every 27 seconds. “This is a machine that is made in America,” he said at the time. It was a memorable moment. But my argument for bringing the Mac back is all about the Bay Area having the people and the proximity to Apple’s headquarters to make the company’s manufacturing experiment a success. This goes beyond sentiment, though even the most analytical are subject to the nostalgic pull of the company’s legacy. “I think it would be great if Apple brought its production back to the Silicon Valley,” says Enrico Moretti, the UC Berkeley economics professor who this year published “The New Geography of Jobs,” a study of why certain places generate certain kinds of work. “That’s where it started. That’s where it historically belongs.” That doesn’t mean he thinks it’s going to happen. And many share that view, given the Bay Area’s expensive land, high wages and steep taxes (though companies, including Apple, have shown great creativity in reducing their tax bills). But hear me out. First, let’s look at what Apple CEO Tim Cook said earlier this month about bringing some Mac production back next year: Apple will spend $100 million on the initiative, which will be carried out by a contract manufacturer. (Think Foxconn and the like, but probably Foxconn.) We can assume that the U.S. Mac factory is going to be a relatively small operation, given that Cook is talking about only a piece of a small slice of what Apple makes. (Annual figures: 125 million iPhones, 58.3 million iPads, 18 million Macs.) Let’s stipulate that Apple isn’t going to give up its enviable profits on the Mac to make the move, because you don’t end up sitting on $121.2 billion in...

By: James D. Sawyer, Manufacturing Engineering Hoosier shop grows as a result of perseverance, determination and diversification The key thing we’ve learned from being in business,” said Brad Carney, a founder and owner of Carney-Echelbarger Machining (C-E; Kokomo, IN), “is that the more that we diversify, the better off we are.” Along with his mother and father, Carney in 2004 launched what was originally known as Carney Custom Machining (CCM) in a building behind his parents’ house in Sharpsville, IN. The intervening years have been a bit of a roller-coaster ride, but with perseverance, determination and diversification, the company now is on a gratifying upward swing. Carney expects that trajectory to continue. While he’s glad about that vertical trend, Carney is probably just as glad about a lateral trend his business has gone through. Before moving into its current 8400-ft² facility this past summer the company operated from the 1800-ft² building it started in. “It was packed to the max,” said Carney. “We were also using my parents’ attached garage to store material. We also were using the driveway, but under-roof we had only 1800 ft².” Within that space was an impressive arsenal of equipment for a startup operation. “We started out with a Fadal 4020 VMC that we bought new,” explained Carney. “We also bought a few pieces of used toolroom equipment: a Bridgeport, a Hardinge toolroom lathe, a new DoAll cutoff saw and a Harig surface grinder.” An Episode of Moonlighting He and his parents launched the company as a sideline to their full-time jobs at a local auto supplier. “We had a lot of contacts in racing and we thought we would have enough work from that to keep us in business,” said Carney. “That’s what led us to go ahead and start the company. We were completely wrong in our assumption that the racing contacts were going to be a good way to keep the business growing. You can probably make a fortune in racing, but it appears that they don’t want to pay very much for machined parts.” Fortunately, they had kept their jobs at the auto supplier and had not bet everything on the roll of the entrepreneurial...

By: Rebecca Carnes, Design-2-Part Magazine Contract manufacturers and job shops weigh in on what OEMs value most in their suppliers Contract manufacturers (CMs) and job shops constantly find themselves under pressure to deliver outstanding price, quality, and on-time delivery to their OEM and product manufacturer customers. Handling tall orders from customers takes dedication and expertise. And delivering on promises with consistency is key to whether a customer returns for more business. What sets some contract manufacturers apart from the pack is not just offering quality, fair prices, and on-time delivery, but also having the flexibility to accommodate changes, an offering of up-front honesty, and a dedication to consistent follow-through. Respondents to an online D2P survey of contract manufacturers overwhelmingly noted that their customers are foremost interested in on-time delivery, competitive pricing, and quality. “Good communication and accountability to do what you commit to is the separator,” said Dan Young, marketing manager for Marik Spring, Inc., a manufacturer of springs and wire forms based in Tallmadge, Ohio (www.marikspring.com). He noted that OEMs assess Marik’s performance based on the company’s ability to respond to change, whether in design or schedule. Quality manufactured products that are delivered on time and within budget is what customers typically are looking for in a supplier, according to Dick Doyle, sales manager for Astro Craft, an Illinois-based company that provides CNC turning and milling of critical components (www.astrocraft.com). The company has been a silver level or better vendor for several key customers during a number of years, he said. Sonoco Protective Solutions, which has won several quality awards, delivers “what is promised, on time with no hassles on invoices,” said marketing specialist Jessica Irons. The South Carolina company produces molded-foam components and packaging across many industries, including automotive, medical, technology, HVAC, and consumer products, and Irons said that they are usually judged by customers on their on-time delivery and ability to deliver products within specification. The ability to hold tight tolerances on complex fabrications, as well as consistency and good service at a fair price, are important to customers of Acme Wire Products Co., Inc., a Mystic, Conn.-based CM that specializes in wire fabrications and wire forms (www.acmewire.com). Once they’ve been...

By: Richard Nass, Design News Manufacturing in the US is making a comeback. It has to be true — it said so in my local newspaper. Actually, a similar story has been reported in lots of places, including a recent study released by the McKinsey Global Institute. That study is titled, “The next era of global growth and innovation.” Propelling this comeback is an increased need to reduce the duration between the time that a product is designed and the time that it appears on the shelves. While much of the design has always occurred in the US, there was generally a lag before the product hit manufacture, which often occurred in a faraway place like China or India. While we like to think we live and work in an ever-shrinking world (and we do), there’s still some amount of time to transfer information. And depending on the size of the run, it may or may not make fiscal sense, especially as manufacturing in the US is gaining momentum. Part of this shift to the US has to do with the fact that labor costs in places like China are on the rise. There are also uncertain and potentially rising tariffs, fluctuating currency exchange rates, and fuel costs that have turned sharply upward in the past 24 months. Mix all those facts together, and when you ask why manufacturing is making a comeback domestically, the question becomes, “Why not?” Wal-Mart recently announced that it would be buying an additional $50 billion worth of US-made products over the next decade. That sounds like a pretty good indicator to me. The company plans to increase orders for items like paper and sporting goods, which it already buys domestically, and bring back production of some textiles, furniture, and higher-end appliances. The latter item surprises me the most, as the US seems to have lost the appliance battle, but time will tell. A defining statement in the McKinsey report sums it up: “As long as companies and countries understand the evolving nature of manufacturing and act on the powerful trends shaping the global competitive environment, they can thrive in this promising future.” It’s generally acknowledged that manufacturing tends...

By: The Association for Manufacturing Technology December U.S. manufacturing technology orders totaled $499.43 million according to AMT – The Association For Manufacturing Technology. This total, as reported by companies participating in the USMTO program, was up 17.8% from November but down 9.4% when compared with the total of $550.99 million reported for December 2011. With a year-end total of $5,705.58 million, 2012 was up 2.6% compared with 2011. These numbers and all data in this report are based on the totals of actual data reported by companies participating in the USMTO program. “Finishing 2012 with the highest order total in 13 years certainly confirms the renaissance of U.S. manufacturing,” said Douglas K. Woods, AMT President. “This also shows the resilience of the industry in the face of GDP contraction in the fourth quarter, along with fiscal and political concerns that have been overshadowing much of the general economy.” The United States Manufacturing Technology Orders (USMTO) report, compiled by the trade association representing the production and distribution of manufacturing technology, provides regional and national U.S. orders data of domestic and imported machine tools and related equipment. Analysis of manufacturing technology orders provides a reliable leading economic indicator as manufacturing industries invest in capital metalworking equipment to increase capacity and improve productivity. U.S. manufacturing technology orders are also reported on a regional basis for five geographic breakdowns of the United States. Northeast Region  Northeast Region manufacturing technology orders in December stood at $74.02 million, up 10.1% from the November total of $67.24 million but down 25.0% when compared with December 2011. The $789.38 million year-end total was 9.0% less than the total for 2011. Southern Region Manufacturing technology orders in the Southern Region in December totaled $78.11 million, up 19.1% from November’s $65.58 million but down 12.4% when compared with December 2011. At $835.28 million, 2012 was up 12.2% when compared with 2011. Midwest Region Midwest Region manufacturing technology orders totaled $166.19 million in December, a rise of 27.3% when compared with November’s $130.54 million but 9.7% less than the total for December 2011. The year-end total of $1,814.51 is 1.0% more than the comparable figure for 2011. Central Region At $125.05 million, December manufacturing technology...