Entries by Bart Taylor

Space holds promise for small manufacturers, but modeling success is proving as challenging as the missions

Here’s how Primes and the companies that fly can make life easier for suppliers If “Prime” contractors like SpaceX and Lockheed Martin, along with companies like lunar explorer Ultimate Machines, are the public face of America’s new space economy, contract manufacturers and other suppliers to the industry are the glue. Their parts comprise the systems […]

What in the World Is Going On at VF Corporation?

Two plus two equals three at Denver’s influential apparel House of Brands A year ago, I forecast tough sledding for VF Corporation, Denver’s multi-billion-dollar apparel and outdoor industry amalgam. The headwinds buffeting most consumer-brand importers were transparent enough then and remain so today; among them are supply-chain disruptions that have turned inventory management into a […]

Co-manufacturers are a catalyst in Colorado’s high-flying food industry. But here’s why brands are struggling to find right-sized manufacturing

Takeaways from the first Colorado Food & Beverage Co-Manufacturing Summit Aerospace gets the headlines, but more Coloradoans work at food companies than in any other manufacturing industry in the state – over 26,000 employees and another 10,000 or so in beverage businesses. As long ago as 2013, growth in this powerhouse sector convinced me that […]

2024 Manufacturing Forecast: 5 Sure Bets

U.S. manufacturing is on a winning streak, even as its success is challenging economic convention. How the newly energized sector co-exists with America’s powerful “import economy” is a topic of interest and intrigue in 2024. Tariffs are sustained. Other pro-manufacturing measures are stymied in ‘24 As fashionable as it’s become to be pro-manufacturing, America still […]

How CEO Lindsay Pack is leading Colorado Springs-based InnovaFlex Foundry, formerly dpiX, into America’s semiconductor future

Colorado’s advanced manufacturing ecosystem is deep in aerospace acumen; established if underpublicized in bioscience and food and beverage; up and coming in battery and EV-related applications; and awakening as a semiconductor node, where America’s newfound interest in a national chip industry has raised the stakes for companies and communities. It would be back to the […]

Colorado wants to land a CHIPs Act-inspired Regional Innovation Hub. Here’s what manufacturers need to know

The Polis administration says it’s all-in on the national competition for 20 new innovation centers that could boost American advanced manufacturing. Local manufacturers stand to benefit – or not. By Bart Taylor, Moss Adams Science and technology influencers gathered in Denver in late May to parse ideas in support of a Colorado bid to land […]

2023 Manufacturing Forecast – 5 sure bets

By Bart Taylor | Dec 13, 2022 By most any measure, 2022 was a transformational year for manufacturing. Here’s an early look at storylines shaping the coming year. 1. 2023 is the year of the semiconductor supply chain – who builds a roadmap that wins? Arizona and Texas were among big winners in the semiconductor […]

Free trade is dead. For manufacturing, good riddance

By Bart Taylor | Nov 29, 2022 I’ve argued, along with Harry Moser and others, for a new industrial policy that picks U.S. manufacturing “to win.” As contrarian a view this was a decade ago, there’s consensus today that we should do just that. The list of desired outcomes reads like an economic manifesto: Protecting […]