The Ben Franklin Technology Partnership was one of the earliest state-sponsored programs in the country established to encourage entrepreneurship and provide seed grants, innovation grants and marketing and technical expertise. The goal of the organization, which now has five outposts around the state, is threefold: to offer seed capital; to help establish innovative manufacturing operations; and to cultivate an infrastructure of incubators. The Northeastern Pennsylvania zone won the Incubator of the Year award last year, and has been integral in helping to establish a new offshoot group of young professionals. But just as important as new launches is the adoption and implementation of new technology into the plants, work processes and products of existing manufacturers. One recent example occurred at Just Born, where a study of the work flow revealed about $4 million in potential savings if a few things were changed.
        "And the first million they didn't spend a thing to get," says Chad Paul, Jr., the new CEO of Ben Franklin Technology Partners in Bethlehem.
        He and his colleagues are quick to point out that their region goes beyond the Lehigh Valley. The Poconos are the fastest-growing area in the state, says Al Philpotts, with Wilkes-Barre-Scranton coming on strong. He tells the story of a small company owned by GE Capital that did metal stamping for IBM PCs. By installing some computer numeric control devices and reconfiguring a few details, the company found no reason its products couldn't be adapted for completely different uses like medical waste processing and transportation. Today, its unionized work force makes a 110-part steel piece for the tops of New York City transit cars.
        "Ben Franklin transforms companies," explains Paul's colleague Al Philpotts. "It is not just about excess capacity, but finding the ideal capacity."
        On the mountainside campus of Lehigh University, a tradition of engineering excellence lives on in a practical mindset when it comes to working with private industry and federal agencies. David B. Williams, Ph.D., vice provost for research, says that 25 percent of the on-campus research is industry-funded, more than three times the level of a typical university.
        Much of that work takes place in three areas: optics, materials research and the study of large structures. The schools' electromicroscopy expertise has proved beneficial to projects for Alcoa, Kodak, Union Carbide and Sandia National Laboratories, to name a few, while its partnerships with the Ben Franklin Technology Partnership, Penn State University and other state institutions have also helped out young and prosperous companies like International Quantum Epitaxy (a maker of 12-inch gallium arsenide wafers) and OraSure (maker of disease self-test kits).
        That direct involvement with the private sector is fortified more each year by curriculum and special programs. New this year are degree programs in Integrated Business and Engineering and Bio-Engineering. Schools like Northampton Community College offer their own flexible menu of training and curriculum tied into business needs.
        Northampton's Hartsell Technology Center serves about 120 companies a year, many of which utilize the Electrotechnology Applications Center, where the various frequencies of electromagnetic radiation are used to design coatings for everything from wrestling mats to Martin Guitars (made in nearby Nazareth). Much of the training is modular and portable, too, which is a quality manufacturers like.
        "Industrial maintenance training is a critical function with all this automation," says Kent Zimmerman, associate dean for technology. "Friskies Pet Care came to us years ago, after Nestle had bought them out. They said, 'There are about 20 plants like ours in the country, and they're looking to shut down one or two. We need to show that we can be competitive, efficient, solve problems and be very cost-effective for the company.'
        "So we developed a curriculum with the assistance of the state for their 55 maintenance people to get upgraded to a baseline level, then they could follow different tracks like electric, mechanical, or HVAC," explains Zimmerman. "It took us five years to go through that program, working around their shifts, building it into a union contract on a pay-for-knowledge kind of system. We helped them get the employees to buy into this, after years of long-term labor-management distrust. They did very well, and actually added some new lines over there. Binney & Smith did the same thing."
        "I think we're driven more by industry than by what other educational institutions are doing," says Keith Hartranft, Assistant Professor of optoelectronics, networking technology, and computer electronics. "When they bid the technician training program for Agere, we were one of the few who responded in a timely manner, and then were able to pick it up within three to six months and get it rolling. By the time I was done, I had trained across all three shifts, including a 4 a.m. class, and we had trained around 300 technicians."
        "Basically, you're really looking for niche markets," says Robert Kopecek, president of the college. "If a company is big enough, they don't need you, because they're going to do it themselves. My pitch historically is to get a CEO, sit him down, and say, 'What are your needs?' If they have needs other than the boardroom - we don't claim to be Duke - then we ask how much they're spending and say, 'Give us a shot.'"
        "Going into vo-tech is really getting kids great jobs coming out of school," says Suhocki. "The vo-tech kids go on to community colleges, and 40 percent of them go on again to four-year programs. So they learn to learn, and they learn what they want to do, at a lower cost early on."
        Education, Education, Education