A consortium advocating for the Spokane tech hub missed out on tens of millions of dollars in federal funding earlier this month, but optimism still surrounds the aerospace manufacturing proposal.

“We have, I believe, a strong value proposition for advanced manufacturing and advanced aerospace manufacturing, and we’ll continue making that effort,” says Gary Ballew, vice president of economic development at Greater Spokane Incorporated—a member organization of the Inland Northwest Consortium that created Spokane’s tech hub proposal.

As reported by the Journal in October, the consortium’s tech hub proposal was one of 31 to receive the federal “regional technology and innovation hub,” or tech hub, designation, enabling it to pursue up to $70 million in federal funding.

The proposal calls for transforming the 386,000-square-foot former Triumph Composite Systems Inc. building, at 1514 S. Flint, in west Spokane, into the American Aerospace Materials Manufacturing Center.

On July 2, however, the U.S. Economic Development Administration announced that the Spokane tech hub wasn't one of the 12 projects to receive a portion of $504 million in federal funding.

“Of course, you’re disappointed that you don’t have that funding,” says Mark Norton, executive director of the Northwest I-90 Manufacturing Alliance—also a member organization of the consortium. “It was a very, very competitive process.”

Despite the disappointing news, Norton and others say there may be opportunities for future funding that the consortium can compete for, keeping alive the plans for the proposed manufacturing center and the goals for the manufacturing industry in the region.

“I’m still optimistic that it’s going to really be a big boon for regional manufacturing, but it’s just going to be on a slower timeline right now,” Norton says, noting that funding may require more involvement from the private sector for the time being.

Being one of the 31 proposals to receive the tech hub designation was a big win in itself, considering there were nearly 400 applications across the country, says Ballew, pointing out that the tech hub designation remains despite missing out on funding.

The Inland Northwest Consortium now will try to learn what it can from this recent funding round and start thinking about next steps.

“The first step is getting (the consortium) together to, as we get more information and find out what happened, try to do some debrief from that and then figure out the next step,” Ballew says.

Future funding may become available for the tech hub program, according to the EDA’s July 2 press release.

“If subsequent funding becomes available, EDA plans to invest in additional Tech Hubs, keeping this innovative program’s momentum going for decades to come,” the press release stated.

At the plant

While the consortium considers its path forward, the proposed site of the American Aerospace Materials Manufacturing Center will continue to house two new tenants it gained this year.

National Industrial Concepts Inc., which does business as NIC Global Manufacturing Solutions, expanded its operations to the Inland Northwest in March.

As previously reported by the Journal, the Woodinville, Washington-based sheet metal manufacturing company occupies about 54,000 square feet in the former Triumph Composite Systems plant.

While the expansion to that building wasn't related to the tech hub designation, NIC Global president and CEO Bridget Brewer told the Journal in March that the manufacturer will look at potential collaboration opportunities as the tech hub takes shape.

“We absolutely have been talking about that and seeing if there are alignments and opportunities to move into the aerospace sector,” Brewer says.

Machinists Institute, a Seattle-based workforce training nonprofit that was founded in 2018 by the Boeing Co.’s largest labor union, began leasing about 4,000 square feet of space in the proposed tech hub building in west Spokane in April—a decision directly tied to the tech hub designation.

“We just saw a great opportunity to be a partner and think about the students that are learning right there and exposed to the actual state-of-the-art equipment that would be put in there,” says Shana Peschek, executive director of Machinists Institute. “It’s a really great connection.”

Machinists Institute is also a member of the Inland Northwest Consortium.

The nonprofit was created to be a training arm focused on workforce development to meet the needs of the employers in the aerospace advanced manufacturing and other manufacturing sectors, Peschek says. It offers apprenticeship, pre-apprenticeship, and professional development programs.

Machinists Institute also is building out a 9,500-square-foot main training center at 8304 N. Regal, in Spokane, but plans to keep leasing the space at the proposed tech hub building following the completion of its main facility here.

“We hope to continue that presence even after we get the other location fully built out, and maybe have a focus on composites and thermoplastics,” she says.

Peschek says that while she was disappointed the Spokane tech hub didn’t receive federal funding earlier this month, she’s optimistic about the consortium’s work going forward.

“I know the work of that collaboration will continue despite that, but this is an investment that we need, to keep the world-class workforce for aerospace here in Washington state, and especially to remain globally competitive,” she says.

As the tech hub plans progress and the consortium works to secure future funding, Machinists Institute will act as a training pipeline for companies already in the region and for future companies that are attracted to the region because of the tech hub designation, she says.

“I think Spokane is really poised to be a major player in aerospace manufacturing,” she says.

The reasons behind the Spokane tech hub missing out on funding from the EDA this month are currently unknown.

Norton speculates that the Spokane tech hub may have missed out partly because aerospace is a more mature technology.

“If you look at the (tech hubs) that got the awards, they were around really new technologies, and I think that could have had an influence,” Norton says.

While the Spokane tech hub would be innovative, it’s more of a step change in an existing technology versus a new technology, he adds.

“I also think the federal government has invested a lot of money already in aerospace just in general,” Norton says, noting that he’s just making educated guesses. “Maybe part of that process was they wanted to help industries that haven’t seen much federal assistance yet.”

The 12 tech hubs selected on July 2 to receive federal funding included a quantum information technology hub in Colorado and New Mexico, a smart photonic sensor system hub in Montana, a biomanufacturing hub in Indiana, a precision fermentation and biomanufacturing hub in Illinois, a lithium batteries and electric vehicle materials hub in Nevada, a semiconductor manufacturing hub in New York, a biofabrication hub in New Hampshire, a clean energy supply chain hub in South Carolina and Georgia, a sustainable and climate-resilient infrastructure hub in Florida, a sustainable polymers hub in Ohio, a secure autonomous systems hub in Oklahoma, and a personalized medicine hub in Wisconsin.

The need for advanced aerospace materials manufacturing still exists, Ballew contends.

“It’s still an important endeavor—the need laid out by the aerospace community on the next generation of aircraft and what it’s going to need to make that happen and make sure that we have the capability to do it here in the United States,” he says.

Further optimism for the future of the Spokane tech hub was also created when, following the announcement about the 12 tech hubs that will receive funding, the EDA made an additional announcement that Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Economic Development Alejandra Castillo plans to visit the American Aerospace Materials Manufacturing Center tech hub.

"While there, she and Tech Hubs Program director Eric Smith will work with the hub to strengthen their strategy to meet the immediate and future demands of defense and commercial aerospace markets, ultimately enabling more—and more sustainable—air travel while advancing a technology sector critical to U.S. national security," a U.S. Department of Commerce press release stated on July 2.