Albasini was making electrodes for the company’s electrode store, true to a key Maine Manufacturing Extension Partnership principal of “lean manufacturing.”
The tour came as FHC Inc., a Bowdoin-based company specializing in manufacturing state-of-the-art instruments for global neurosurgery customers, was presented a 2012 Manufacturing Excellence Award by the Maine Manufacturing Extension Partnership.
The group examined a deep brain stimulation electrode the company developed, and President and CEO Keri Seitz talked about the advantages of FHC’s “microTargeting” equipment, which may help researchers treat disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease and depression.
Department of Economic and Community Development Commissioner George Gervais said the company has “institutionalized the process for generating new ideas and rapidly testing them for commercial success,” which has allowed FHC to “bring new products to market in exceptionally short time-frames with minimal waste of money and time and hence minimal risk.”
Founded in 1970, FHC has designed and manufactured more than 7,000 metal microelectrodes and a broad range of clinical and research devices. Its clients include scientists and clinicians studying at major universities, medical schools, research hospitals, government research institutions and private laboratories around the world.
The business, which employs 100, is located in the town’s former elementary school along Route 125. The former classrooms now house a child care service FHC provides its employees, a fitness center and a gym that’s open to the public.
“The company has an outstanding record both as an innovative leader in its industry as well as being a great corporate citizen in the community,” Maine MEP Board of Directors Chairman Bruce Pulkkinen said.
Maine Manufacturing Extension Partnership is supported by the National Institute of Standards and Technology in the U.S. Department of Commerce and the state of Maine to help smalland medium-sized manufacturers identify and implement advanced manufacturing and management technologies.
The award to FHC was being presented as part of Maine MEP’s designation of October as manufacturing month, to highlight the importance of manufacturing in the U.S. economy.
“Manufacturing is a highly skilled technology-driven industry these days that engages some of the best scientific minds in the world,” Pulkkinen said. However, “Too many young people don’t always think of manufacturing as a career option.”
“To some, American manufacturing is seen as a declining industry with not much future,” he said. “The public image of manufacturing more often may be of the oldfashioned heavy industry shop floors of the past, rather than the clean rooms and highly sophisticated operations that you might find here at FHC.”
Pulkkinen said the Maine Manufacturing Extension Partnership is encouraging high school and college students to consider job opportunities in manufacturing in Maine.
“Manufacturing needs to attract our best, most talented students,” he said. “To do this, we need to let them know that manufacturing in Maine has a bright future with good paying jobs.”
Gervais said his department is working with 16 businesses considering expansion or relocation in Maine that could bring millions of dollars and 200 new jobs here.
“We certainly would love to connect these people considering Maine with companies who have a success story to tell like FHC,” he told employees Wednesday, “to help sell what Maine has got to offer the rest of the world.”
John Butera, senior economic advisor to Gov. Paul LePage, congratulated the FHC team, telling them, “Folks, manufacturing is alive and well and not only in the country but most importantly in Maine.”
FHC has demonstrated characteristics manufacturers must have today to be competitive in the marketplace, Butera said. They must innovate, and when they innovate, bring those products to market.
“Nothing happens until the cash register rings,” he said.
Seitz said the company learned of Maine Manufacturing Extension Partnership through FHC board member Heather Blease, who had heard about a program it offered allowing FHC to learn about a new innovative engineering approach.
A little over a year since the company started the program, “we have completely embraced and brought into our design and development process, the whole Innovating Engineering program,” she said.
As a result of the program, FHC already has a product on the market.
The “fail fast fail cheap” approach has allowed the business to find hurdles early, address them, “and use that to our advantage to develop new products,” Seitz said.
Whether lean manufacturing or new production planning software, “our group; the entire team, remains open to new ideas and ways of doing things, which I believe makes us more successful as a company.”
For more information about FHC Inc. visit www.fhco.com and visit www.mainemep.org to learn more about the Maine Manufacturing Extension Partnership.
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