Finalists were announced last week in the 6th annual Colorado Manufacturing Awards, contested in over a dozen industry and achievement categories. The CMAs are co-hosted by CompanyWeek business media, and Manufacturer's Edge, the NIST-sponsored Colorado Manufacturing Extension Partner, and supported by several trade and industry groups including CAMA, the Colorado Advanced Manufacturing Association.

More than 40 companies -- three finalists in each category -- were selected along with three women from an influential group of nominees considered for Colorado Manufacturing Woman of the Year, sponsored by the Colorado chapter of Women in Manufacturing.  

CMA finalists hail from communities from across the state. Boulder County led the way with nine finalists, including all three in the aerospace category. It's not just Boulder -- manufacturers of all kinds have set up shop along the U.S. 287 corridor from Lafayette to Longmont. (...)

FiberLok is a 40-year-old company that specializes in dimensional graphics and branded apparel heat transfers & stickers. In essence, FiberLok is one of only 2 or 3 places in the world using advanced flocking techniques to create high-quality apparel graphics printed with fibers rather than ink. Started by an avid inventor named Brown Abrams, FiberLok holds over 100 patents and boasts such clients as the National Hockey League, Pepsi, and Major League Baseball. Even if the name of the company isn’t familiar, their work has been showcased on some of the world’s largest stages, including on uniforms worn during the World Series and the Superbowl.

After several decades of steady growth, FiberLok found themselves working with increasingly larger companies. As is often the case, the larger the company, the more in-depth the application process for potential vendors becomes, and the more they want to know about required quality systems. Ultimately, when an automotive client approached FiberLok to let them know that they would need to obtain ISO certification in order to retain their business, they knew the time was right to level up. After meeting with a Regional Director from Manufacturer’s Edge, FiberLok decided to add a myriad of other services in addition to ISO, including huddles training and accountability mapping.

Over the course of several months, the team at FiberLok collaborated with Manufacturer’s Edge and the ISO experts at Cavendish-Scott to establish the necessary protocols and documentation to obtain their ISO certification. The tools and training they picked up along the way by using daily huddle meetings, sketching out specific metrics and accountabilities, etc. helped in the effort. According to FiberLok Vice President Alan Ziglin, the endeavor was successful thanks to unanimous buy-in throughout the organization–from top to bottom. And, although it was a significant effort that requires ongoing commitment and diligence, the results have been staggering. Not only was FiberLok able to retain the automotive client who asked them to get certified, but they have also picked up additional accounts based on their new designation. As Alan Ziglin points out, “We have more opportunities now. It’s one of the first things they ask if you want to become a vendor to a company. They want to know that they can have a different level of trust.”

World Trade Day is an international trade and investment conference with over 700 participants from across the Rocky Mountain Region and around the globe. This year’s theme is Digital Globalization, and how technology is helping to accelerate connections, transparency and trade.

Learn from local and global experts, connect with your peers based on your topic of interest and your specific industry, set up B2B meetings, and connect through chats and video calls. Have fun with speed networking; you never know who you will be matched with and let it be the start of something great.

Join us to discuss the impact of global trade on our region and learn how to jump-start your business, mitigate risk, and leverage the latest technology to boost your global

operations.

Last Monday’s mass shooting in Boulder is yet another reminder in the past year of reminders that controlling known risks does not guarantee security. The known-unknowns and the unknown-unknowns are still out there. As Helen Keller, an extraordinary model for resiliency, commented: “Security is mostly a superstition.”

Nonetheless, I will continue to insist that my grandchildren wear seatbelts, look both ways before crossing the street, eat their vegetables, and not breathe in my face when they or I are unmasked. I will continue to take precautions.

When it comes to cybersecurity, the probability of experiencing an attack is high, and yet many organizations and individuals demonstrate either an Alfred Neumann-style optimism bias (“What—me worry?”) or an Eeyore-style defeatist bias (“It’s all for naught.”). Either mindset is flawed. The simple message this month is: Focus on what you can control, not what you can’t. (...)

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