Offering World-Class Solutions for Manufacturing Companies

NAIMI Services

NAIMI provides a range of services that benefit your company/organization's performance and bottom line. These services are shown graphically below.

Any of the services shown above can be provided at a level that satisfies your needs. NAIMI provides flexible arrangements that meet your needs. It is the very broad range, depth, and geographic distribution of our connections and partners in manufacturing, R&D, education, workforce and economic development, investment, and government that allows us to bring the most relevant resources to bear on your need. Services can be provided on a one-off basis or as benefits of different levels on ongoing memberships.

Participation in the Roadmap

Participation by EDOs, manufacturers, educators, R&D orgs, and government in the Roadmap has resulted in commitments of more than $250K to date by our partners for the First Phase of the Economic-Technology Roadmap. NAIMI is now developing plans for the Second Phase,

There is value to private sector companies and organizations in participating in the First Phase of the Roadmap as it ensures the issues that are important to them are researched and assessments made of those issues of particular relevance to a company or organization.

There is even greater benefit to companies and organizations in participating in the Second Phase of the Roadmap, as it is in the Second Phase that solutions to the issues that are impacting manufacturing are addressed and solutions put in place.

Any business, company, or organization can participate directly in either the First and/or Second Phases of the Roadmap by becoming a NAIMI member. Specifics of participation can be found below in the Membership section.

Connecting Businesses to R&D Solutions

NAIMI has very strong connections to R&D organizations, including colleges and universities, national laboratories, and R&D companies. NAIMI can provide a highly effective means of connecting industry with technology solutions that can be provided by the R&D organizations.

NAIMI can provide services either as an element of membership or as a service for a fee by organizing efforts to solve a technology problem for a business utilizing our knowledge of and contacts with R&D personnel. This provides a cost-effective way for business to connect with the capabilities at R&D organizations in an easy way by having NAIMI do the work of finding the person or group who is the best matched to address the business's need. Fees for such a service start at $500 and go up to more than $10K per instance depending on the difficulty and scope of the issues that the company needs to have addressed.

Connecting SMEs to the Internet of Things (IOT) / Cloud Resources

Manufacturers clearly recognize the value of the potential energy savings by monitoring and controlling equipment. In fact the concept for NAIMI was initiated in part by a collaborative effort led by Tom Bowles and Gopal Rao that included Los Alamos and Sandia National Laboratories, Intel, ISMI (part of SEMATECH), Applied Materials, Edwards Vacuums, and the State of New Mexico. The project was to demonstrate the energy savings that could be realized at a manufacturing plant by incorporating intelligent monitoring and control systems. The problem was that there were (and still are) no national or international standards that would allow for cost-effective use of control and monitoring equipment for manufacturing equipment

In the intervening 7 years, IOT equipment has become available that allows large manufacturing companies to implement some degree of monitoring and control with the resultant power savings. While large manufacturers may have the technical staff to implement monitoring and control equipment, SMEs often do not have the technology expertise to model their systems and to design and install monitoring and control equipment. NAIMI can provide this capability for a fee.

Providing Analysis of Big Data

A second area of importance to manufacturing companies is the ability to handle Big Data. Manufacturing produces more data than any other industrial sector. The data from manufacturing processes holds the key to understanding energy usage, bottlenecks, inefficiencies, time and effort, and other measures of performance. Overall efficiency can be improved, often by significant amounts, by understanding the information the data provides.

Surveys show that 84% of companies state they see the need to handle the Big Data that they produce but that only 16% state they have the ability to handle Big Data. This is another area in which NAIMI's connections can be brought to bear to provide companies with analysis of their big Data in a highly cost-effective manner.

Extending the Reach of EDOs

NAIMI is well connected to Economic Development Organizations (EDOs) along the Border and we are working to strengthen and expand our connections to EDOs. These connections are an important element of NAIMI's efforts as they allow us to work with and benefit local EDOs by extending their reach to maximize their ability to attract and grow manufacturing businesses. Our goal is to work with and benefit local EDOs as opposed to competing with them.

An important element of this part of NAIMI's efforts are to provide high value to EDOs by informing them of companies that are transitioning from the startup to the manufacturing stage. This allows the EDOs to get a 1-3 year head start over other developers in trying to get the company to locate the manufacturing at their site. The company would also see the value in this by finding them the best possible site. NAIMI can provide this service due to our very broad and deep connections to R&D efforts.

The model for working with EDOs is comprised of two elements: memberships and services for a fee. The advantage of memberships is that EDOs are kept constantly aware of new developments in business, workforce, technology, and government affairs through the NAIMI website, newsletters, meetings, and forums. As part of the value of being a member, we will also directly inform an EDO of any new developments and opportunities that are likely to be of interest to them.

As an alternate approach, NAIMI can provide an EDO with specific services that they contract for in pursuing a specific opportunity. Such services for a fee can include providing an assessment of the advantages of locating at a particular site, assistance in getting workforce development in place by NAIMI providing specific training courses, and working with local, state, and government officials to see what incentives could be provided to get a company to locate at a specific site. Such one-off services could range in cost from $1000 to $20,000 (or more) depending on the scope and scale of the effort needed.

Education and Workforce Development

Education and workforce development must be a central element of becoming globally competitive in manufacturing. NAIMI includes both short-term and long-term efforts in this area that will be supported by membership fees.

NAIMI will work with industry, community colleges, colleges, and universities on planning to ensure workforce development is included in economic development growth efforts. This will provide communities in the Border States a competitive edge over other sites a company is considering as it will ensure the trained workforce needed will be available when it is needed.

NAIMI will also work with industry and educational institutions to implement new certification programs to meet specific workforce needs.

Finally, NAIMI can develop materials and presentations and host webinars that provide services to the full range of our partners and to individuals, organizations, companies, and institutions that are interested in Intelligent Manufacturing. Interest is such a service has already been expressed by some of our partners. As part of developing a High-Level Roadmap using existing data, we will assess what subjects would be of most interest and then begin to develop the webinar series. A particular aspect of webinars that we are looking at is MOOCs focused on digital manufacturing and design, following the example of FUMEC in Mexico.

Other Services

NAIMI can offer several other services, as shown in the graphic above. In addition, NAIMI is initiating monthly newsletters and will organize webinars, seminars, workshops, symposia, and conferences that address issues of relevance for manufacturing.

Membership

Following the model developed by Sematech NAIMI offers memberships that provide a range of benefits that vary depending on the membership level. The range of services runs from basic services for all members (listed below) to access to a wider range of services described earlier. NAIMI has adopted a variable membership rate the depends on both the size of the member and the range of services provided.

Basic Services are those services that all members receive, regardless of membership level, and include:

• Monthly newsletters that provide information on issues of importance to the manufacturing sector.
• Free access to all webinars, seminars, workshops, symposia, and conferences.
• EDOs are kept constantly aware of new developments in business, workforce, technology, and government affairs
• R&D organizations are provided with an effective means of technology transfer and commercialization
• Businesses have a direct conduit to EDOs, R&D, educational institutions, and workforce over the entire length of the U.S.-Mexico Border
• All members have access to various degrees of information based on their membership level
• The Roadmap will be used to identify the needs and issues of our members and serve as the basis for NAIMI to inform (as opposed to lobby) legislators of needs and issues. NAIMI provides high value to our members by coordinating and consolidating support along the Border for legislative action to grow manufacturing.

Annual membership fees start at $250 for basic services for small companies, increasing to $5000 for large companies. NAIMI also offers higher level memberships that provide access to the various services listed above with the membership fee depending on the range of services included and the size of the company. NAIMI can customize your membership to provide exactly those services you require without paying for unneeded services. Please contact us to arrange a quote for your needs.

As NAIMI grows and the range and depth of our connections grow to provide your company/organization with increased service, membership fees will increase to $500 for small companies and organizations and range up to $20,000+ for large companies and organizations.

As an inducement to experience what NAIMI can provide, NAIMI is making a once-only offer to each new member for a 3-month trail membership at one quarter the annual cost. After the first quarter, you would need to pay the annual fee if you wish to continue membership in NAIMI. This offer allows your company to see first hand the value and benefit of becoming a NAIMI member at minimal cost without any longer-term commitment.

Additional Services

Specific information on other services as well as quotes on the membership fee for specific services can be obtained from Jessica Lillie at jlillie@fumec.org.