In December 2014, Congress passed the Revitalize American Manufacturing and Innovation Act (RAMI), which established the National Network for Manufacturing Innovation Program. This Program, now generally referred to as Manufacturing USA.
RAMI formally established the Manufacturing USA program as part of the strategy to revitalize American manufacturing. The Program consists of a collection of individual Institutes, the Network of Institutes, and the National Program Office, located at NIST, to oversee the Program.
The NIST Office of Advanced Manufacturing (OAM) manages NIST outreach in the area of advanced manufacturing, including providing federal financial assistance in programs such as AMTech and open-topic competition Manufacturing USA institutes. The OAM also serves as the headquarters for the interagency Advanced Manufacturing National Program Office (AMNPO). The national program office is staffed by representatives from federal agencies with manufacturing-related missions as well as fellows from manufacturing companies and universities, and works in close partnership with advanced manufacturing offices in the Department of Defense, the Department of Energy, NASA, the National Science Foundation, the Department of Education and the Department of Agriculture.
For additional details, please see the NIST OAM Organizational Profile here.
In 2016, NIST issued the first competition to establish new Manufacturing USA Institutes. Like the other institutes that are part of the Manufacturing USA network, the NIST institutes are private-public partnerships that foster collaboration among industry, academia, nonprofits and government agencies. Through the institutes, these stakeholders work to accelerate U.S. innovation and to increase U.S. competitiveness by investing in industrially relevant, cross-cutting advanced manufacturing products and resources.
For more information about the national Manufacturing USA Program, visit the program's site manufacturingUSA.com.