To move your company to a better place, it matters more where you are than where you want to go. And before you can see clearly where you are, you must clarify your perspective.

Water is essential for life. Unfortunately, it is often contaminated with trace pharmaceuticals, caffeine, synthetic hormones and beauty product chemicals.

Recent headlines have provided stark reminders that cheap manufactured goods from overseas often come at the expense of human lives.

EAST HARTFORD, CT—Pratt & Whitney has flight-tested jet engine components made from metal additive manufacturing processes.

In April, electronics assembler Mack Technologies completed work on a substantial installation of money-saving technology at its factory in Westford, MA. The company didn’t get a new paste printer, reflow oven or pick-and-place machine. In fact, the plant’s slick new technology had nothing to do with assembly.

Compliant mechanisms are jointless, elastic structures that reduce costs and simplify product designs. These single-piece flexible structures elastically deform without joints to produce a desired functionality.

STORRS, CT—The University of Connecticut and Pratt & Whitney, have opened of a new additive manufacturing research laboratory here.

Design for manufacture and assembly (DFMA) does well as a stand-alone methodology for simplifying product designs and lowering production costs. However, DFMA should also be hailed as a pathway to lean manufacturing.

America’s manufacturing sector gained 14,000 jobs in February, according to the latest data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Manufacturers vigorously seek out best practices because they can improve metrics, such as stock price, sales and profitability. There’s only one problem: Best practices are the actions that solved yesterday’s problems.

The manufacturing industry is at a turning point, requiring the ability to visualize the possibilities and challenges to come so preparations can be made now.

Boothroyd Dewhurst, Inc., will host the twenty-eighth annual International Forum on Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DFMA®) on June 12-14, 2013. This year’s Forum, “Engineering Value with DFMA—Unlocking Profits in Product Design,” will take place at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, Providence-Warwick, R.I., USA.

The invitation-only Digital and Advanced Manufacturing Exchange cannot predict the future. But it can offer senior manufacturing executive best practices for quick ROI from the latest technologies with case studies and opinions from senior level practitioners.