The Fayette County Chamber of Commerce recently welcomed FASTLANE Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) to its membership.

The FASTLANE program is located within the University of Dayton Research Institute and was created by the National Institute of Standards and Technology to help small and medium manufacturing companies – with up to 500 employees – become more innovative to drive economic growth and job creation.

The FASTLANE team does this by connecting manufacturing companies to the right solutions. They act as an unbiased third party adviser/project manager to small and medium sized manufacturing companies to help them whittle down their “I want to do” lists. This list often consists of product development, improvement ideas, and training that are often delayed simply because the business has to focus on getting the product out the door on time. By helping get these projects off the ground, FASTLANE is able to help manufacturing companies accelerate their growth and profitability.

FASTLANE’s area of assistance are in continuous improvement, workforce development, sustainability, supply chain development and technology acceleration. The FASTLANE team is made up of individuals who came from manufacturing and understand the need to move at the speed of industry.

“Our team not only has the technical experience to solve problems but also vast experience on the business side of manufacturing as well. We want to speak to those who are in an engineering, operations or management position in any of the industries mentioned,” said Josh Kemplin, manufacturing growth specialist. “We want to be the manufacturers’ first call when they don’t know where else to go or if they don’t have time to get started. If you are too busy to talk to us, then you probably need to talk to us.”

Chamber president, Whitney Gentry, said the chamber is happy to welcome FASTLANE as a member who can partner with current manufacturing members to assist them with their productivity and profitability.

For more information on FASTLANE, visit their website at www.fastlane-mep.org, or call (937) 229-1368.

This article was submitted by the Fayette County Chamber of Commerce.