Helping Manufacturers to Innovate
Linking manufacturers to the right knowledge, facilities and support to help them grow
Here at KTN we’ve been supporting the Future of British Manufacturing initiative since its inception a couple of years ago, working in partnership with Autodesk, BEIS, The Manufacturer magazine, HVM Catapult, Lloyds Bank, and others. We’ve thoroughly enjoyed the collaborative approach, which has taken as its starting point asking manufacturers what challenges and opportunities they see in the future; what they want. The ultimate aim is the same as ours here in the KTN manufacturing team: to help manufacturers innovate and grow, by linking them to the right knowledge, facilities and support.
The Future of British Manufacturing initiative is free to join, and particularly suited to SME manufacturers. Here is what is on offer:
1.     Access to a digital strategy template to help you explore what your future might look like
2.     A personalised report on readiness (based on an online assessment)
3.     An online discovery meeting with an advisor
4.     Access to demonstrations of technologies that might help you move forward
5.     Hook up with students from strong design and manufacturing universities, to help you adopt those new technologies.
The initiative acts as one of the tools in the toolkit – and might act, for example, as a fantastic starting point before, say, looking at a Knowledge Transfer Partnership, or an Innovate UK grant or loan, which are rather more involved to apply for. It also fits nicely with our topic-specific initiatives: 4Manufacturing and our Special Interest Groups (which include additive manufacturing, immersive technology, robotics and AI, synthetic biology and uncertainty quantification and management).
Another thing we love about the Future of British Manufacturing initiative is that it helps get young engineers enthused about manufacturing as a career choice, and this initiative gives them hands-on, real world experience.
To find out more, take a look at this introductory video or the website, and get innovating!