NextFlex News – May 2025
Dear friends, colleagues, and supporters:
Recently, leaders, stakeholders, and supporters from across Ohio and the nation gathered at Lorain County Community College to jointly celebrate 10 years of Ohio Technical Skills Innovation Network (OhioTechNet, OTN) and NextFlex, America’s Hybrid Electronics Institute. The Spitzer Conference Center was the perfect venue to showcase the past decade of development and impact in education and workforce development.
Following a welcome by Dr. Marcia Ballinger, Lorain County Community College President, I was given the opportunity to share with those gathered how closely intertwined NextFlex and OTN have been since their respective foundings. The original proposal team for what would become NextFlex sought workforce training insights from the nascent leadership cadre of OTN.
Over the years, the relationship and truly, partnership, deepened as OTN grew to include all 22 Community College in the State of Ohio many of whom are FlexFactor® adopters. Both organizations have demonstrated commitments to supporting the Department of Defense and Defense Industrial Base through the deployment of FlexFactor, innovative learn and earn, and development a network of support for OEMs, small and medium manufacturers, and vendors throughout the supply chain.
Two powerful panels highlighted best practices in workforce development as well as opened the aperture of industry insights around collaboration and talent needs. NextFlex members, Blue Halo, Novaguard, and EWI shared with NextFlex EWD Senior Program Manager, Lauren Friedman, as well as the gathered audience about their own experiences in looking for, developing, and retaining talent.
A key takeaway: digitization and automation are not to be feared but rather embraced as a way to enable innovation driven by innate human creativity. Additionally, as technology rapidly evolves a certain amount of flexibility from both academia and industry will be required to prepare talent to meet the demands and ultimately, lead the innovation that will continue to secure US manufacturing as a global standard.
Brynt Parmeter, former NextFlex Director of Education and Workforce Development, now in his capacity as Department of Defense Chief Talent Management Officer gave a keynote sharing stories and lauding the last decade of impact.
As he closed, Mr. Parmeter shared how he is looking forward with hope to the generational change that is underway as OhioTechNet and NextFlex deepen the wells of skilled talent in Ohio and the nation, creating resiliency in the Defense Industrial Base, and ultimately, creating an environment where advanced manufacturing is not just a job but the career of choice for millions of Americans.
In other news, on June 10, we will be hosting a half-day member-only meeting at UMass Boston in conjunction with the TechBlick Conference, “The Future of Electronics Reshaped.” The NextFlex Member Meeting: AI for Hybrid Electronics will be followed by a reception. The agenda will consist of invited technical presentations and interactive discussions about the state of the art in hybrid electronics, including a session where we take a collective look at how AI can help drive hybrid electronics manufacturing in myriad ways including process optimization, improved yield and reliability, automation, and design and development. The session will feature breakout groups that enable members to weigh in on priorities for NextFlex.
If you are a NextFlex member and are interested in giving a short introductory presentation at the NextFlex Member Meeting or bringing a demo or poster to display, please make sure to open next week’s Wednesday Member Update for more information.
I hope to see many of you in the coming months.
Sincerely,
Dan Gamota, Ph.D.
NextFlex Executive Director