RapidTech, a nonprofit organization on the campus of the University of California at Irvine, may be the manufacturing industry’s secret weapon. By merging education and business, the organization provides low-cost, cutting-edge services to United States companies while training students to take the lead in the next level of manufacturing innovation.
The National Center for Rapid 
Technologies, a part of UC Irvine’s Engineering School, is radically changing manufacturing technology. In just a few years, the Center, which was once housed at Saddleback College, has produced everything from medical devices to resin casts of human hands–including fingerprints.
Using 3-D digital scanners and printers, and computer-assigned design, RapidTech also helped Genevo Airflow Systems recreate parts for a 1938 Japanese Zero fighter plane. The project was part of a restoration effort at an aviation museum.
While the Center has worked with behemoths such as Ford, Disney and Boeing, it also provides low-cost services to entrepreneurial companies and small businesses that cannot afford traditionally high manufacturing costs. RapidTech takes on hundreds of projects each year to help U.S. companies improve manufacturing efforts.
The equipment is not cheap: The Center uses the type of high-end game computers made by Alienware, and its 20-plus 3-D printers start at $50,000 and can go up in price to $1 million.
In addition to providing low-cost, innovative services to U.S. companies, RapidTech has another goal. It plans to transform the manufacturing process through education. The Center conducts outreach and training seminars, but primarily it is educating its engineering students in this advanced manufacturing technology.
According to Mark Madou, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at UC Irvine, “Innovation and manufacturing are intertwined, but in the U.S., this connection has been neglected for too long.” However, thanks in part to RapidTech’s work, the U.S. may soon be the manufacturing leader once again.
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