Customers always said to us, we can’t find individuals to work on second shift or third shift. We need automation. So, the game changed for us as a company.

In this episode of Manufacturing Matters, Nino LaDuca, CEO, Shape Technologies and Simon Kenworthy, Global President, Shape Process Automation joined TECH B2B Marketing’s Winn Hardin to talk about the global economy and the state of manufacturing across different verticals. These included automotive and electric vehicle manufacturing, food processing, life sciences, and more. The group also discussed global automation adoption trends and how advancements in technologies like robots and AI are transforming certain industrial processes in areas such as aerospace and logistics. Additional topics included global collaborative robot trends, waterjet technologies, and Shape’s growing need for high-end business development talent.

Winn Hardin: [00:00:06] Hey everybody, and welcome to a new episode of “Manufacturing Matters,” where we talk about the technology and the trends that are shaping the global manufacturing industry. My name is Winn Hardin, and I’m here on “Manufacturing Matters” with two esteemed guests that we have talked with at different times,  but I’m so glad to welcome you back. We’ve got Nino LaDuca from Shape Technologies Group, and we’ve got Simon Kenworthy from Shape Process Automation

Nino LaDuca: [00:00:27] Thanks. Nice to see you again, Winn.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:00:29] Yeah. Thank you, Winn. Excited about this.

Winn Hardin: [00:00:32] I’m glad you guys came and visit me down in Florida where the weather’s always warm.

Nino LaDuca: [00:00:35] Not today!

Simon Kenworthy: [00:00:36] It’s a little chilly.

Winn Hardin: [00:00:38] Yeah, so… STG, SPA, very well-known companies. You guys have been around for —— is it 35, 50 years?

Nino LaDuca: [00:00:47] Shape Technologies Group owns several different companies, Winn, and one of them, Flow International, the global ultra high-pressure waterjet company, celebrated 50 years of business in 2024. And the business that Simon leads, Shape Process Automation, is 35, 40 years old?

Simon Kenworthy: [00:01:05] Actually 52 years old

Nino LaDuca: [00:01:09] if we consider our operations in Sweden. So lots of history.

Winn Hardin: [00:01:11] But, for the six people in the audience who don’t know you guys, I thought you could kick us off, tell us a little bit about STG, and then maybe Simon could follow up with a deeper dive on SPA.

Nino LaDuca: [00:01:21] Absolutely. So Shape Technologies Group is a management company. We are owned by private equity. And typically we go out and acquire businesses that have unique technologies with a global footprint. So Flow International, KMT, and H2O Jet are three of the premium brands when it comes to ultra high-pressure water jet, whether it’s the form of a 2D XY cutting table or the ultra high-pressure pumps. We also invest in companies that focus on industrial cleaning and surface preparation. And then our robotics and automation group, which Simon leads —— headquartered in Auburn Hills, Michigan —— has a global footprint really focused on the latest and greatest technology when it comes to robotics and what we’ll call flexible automation.

Winn Hardin: [00:02:09] Okay. Do you want to pick up on that, Simon?

Simon Kenworthy: [00:02:12] Yeah, absolutely.

Winn Hardin: [00:02:13] So robotics integration is a key component, but are you also helping to integrate the other systems that are in Shape Technologies Group?

Simon Kenworthy: [00:02:19] Yeah, we try and get some in-house business wherever we can. It’s part of the automation journey that the Shape Technologies Group is going on in our factories that we try and support. And obviously we have a good chance of winning that work most times. But, yeah, to kind of echo off of what Nino was saying, you know, we’ve been on that journey as well. Ten years ago we were 85% automotive and mainly in the soft trim, headliner, car cockpit with the waterjet technology. And we transitioned, in 2019 when we put four companies together, into being a broader end-to-end automation company. Islands of automation in key technologies like waterjet routing, laser, and then adding on waterjet cleaning —— in the aerospace industry mainly —— and de-shelling in the investment cast business, as well as end-to-end automation in food, in logistics, in general industry. So yeah, a real gamut of end-to-end automation.

Winn Hardin: [00:03:19] And I think we were going to jump in a little bit into what you’re seeing from those industries, because as we record this right now, guys, it’s the beginning of 2025. We’re just outside the A3 Business Forum, where Alan Beaulieu gave his usual uplifting forecast for the world. But it’s funny… I say that, if anybody of you guys have seen Alan Beaulieu before, I mean, he’s an incredibly talented, genius economist with ITR Economics —— they track the manufacturing industry very, very closely —— and has been giving feedback to A3 members for years, decades, I think at this point. And the good news for industrial automation is that we came off a little bit of a flat year in 2024, and ’25 and ’26 and ’27 are looking much more promising. But there were some surprises in the outlook that I think Alan was bringing to us, not just those… We won’t even go into the 2030 time frame that Alan likes to talk about. But I know that you’ve got some special insight because of your association with the automotive industry, about where that market is right now, because there’s been a little bit of a retrenchment. So I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about what’s going on there.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:04:23] Yeah, it’s been an interesting time. And great point about Alan Beaulieu and ITR. You know, we follow those guys extremely closely because they’ve been really accurate and their data shows that. Yeah, we were expecting a better year in ’24 —— you know, mild industrial recession, first half interest rates drop a little and things pick up in the second half. It just didn’t happen. So it was time to invest internally and get stronger, ready for growth. Automotive is a great, great part of that. You know we’re still at pre-2018 automotive sales in terms of vehicle sales. Huge investment from the major players, the major OEMs in EV technology —— massive, massive investments maybe just haven’t paid off. So, you know, the view of what’s happening in electrification, whether it’s a hybrid platform that really is the future, whether it’s fuel cell, whether it’s true EV… Again, infrastructure is probably not there in the US for a true EV domestic product. But, we’re looking at hybrid and what that means. Indicators like Nissan licensing that technology for hybrid vehicles and launching those vehicles this year really shows that there will be movement. And as people start to buy vehicles again, you know, we’re confident that we’re ideally positioned to take some of that business.

Winn Hardin: [00:05:49] As I look at EVs on a personal basis, I continually come back to hybrid, just because, unless you’ve got two different cars —— one that works really great 2–300 miles… And, the other thing, I think you touched on an excellent point there, is the domestic US charging infrastructure. I’ve been hearing… I think they started some initiatives on that funding three years ago, but have only developed maybe less than 100 stations. But isn’t this supposed to be the year that that kind of really expands? They’ve got property acquisitions, eminent domain, or whatever has been exercised. Are you hearing anything about that from the OEMs?

Nino LaDuca: [00:06:25] I mean, we’re forecasting that a lot of these EV programs that were delayed or stalled in 2024 will actually pick up and launch in the mid-part of 2025. Whether that’s due to the infrastructure, whether that’s due to consumers starting to go out and buy these vehicles in larger amounts than they previously have, we are certainly banking on that in 2025.

Winn Hardin: [00:06:47] Well the dropping interest rates are definitely going to help that as well. That always helps the industrial automation industry, because we want companies who are interested in capital expenditures.

Nino LaDuca: [00:06:57] Exactly.

Winn Hardin: [00:06:58] Who are trying to improve their plants, become more efficient, save their workers from their dirty, dull, dangerous jobs.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:07:04] And what was interesting that Alan [Beaulieu] mentioned this morning, these data centers, these huge data centers taking up massive amounts of power, which, you know, again, that’s going to maybe impact the the infrastructure growth in EV charging stations.

Winn Hardin: [00:07:18] That’s an excellent point, which I know… I wonder if that includes Bitcoin guys or if that’s just purely cloud providers…?

Nino LaDuca: [00:07:27] I’m not sure. You know that whole Bitcoin thing… I don’t really understand it, so I don’t invest in it…

Winn Hardin: [00:07:34] I don’t either. But I know we’re going to have a lot of good comments from those out there who are doing more.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:07:39] I’m more about coin than bitcoin. I like to be able to hold it or at least see it. Give it to my children.

Winn Hardin: [00:07:46] Exactly. Something that doesn’t lose 70% of its value in three months.

Nino LaDuca: [00:07:51] Yeah, but it was interesting… If we continue to talk about Alan Beaulieu’s presentation —— and he’s done this for a couple of years, or at least communicating this —— that the next 5 to 7 years are going to be where we’re going to create a lot of wealth. A lot of these automation companies are going to do very well for themselves. And to your point, you know, 2030, 2032 will be sort of the recession. So I think there’s a lot of people that are going to invest in our industry, whether it’s customers, whether it’s business owners, there’s going to be a real great runway for the next 5 to 7 years for this industry.

Winn Hardin: [00:08:25] I agree with you and actually… Go ahead, Simon, I can tell you have something to add.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:08:27] I was going to say, I’ve seen Alan’s presentation over a number of years. I think this is the first time he hasn’t said, “Sell your company to somebody you don’t like just before 2030.” I see that window maybe pushing out just a little bit.

Winn Hardin: [00:08:41] Well you know, there were two things in there that struck me. One was that all his forecasts pretty much ended at 2027. They used to go longer, I’m pretty sure. And the other thing was, is that he really qualified what it’s going to be like. So if you guys have never seen Alan Beaulieu —— or, there’s John Mauldin, there’re a number of economists out there , are saying the same thing: that basically, population growth curves in major civilized countries, government debt exceeding 100-plus percent of GDP, plus other factors like retiring baby boomers, smaller working populations to be able to support them, increasing medical costs… All these things will contribute to a very slow period during the 2030s. So if you haven’t seen it, you might want to go check it out, because it’s really interesting. And preparing your businesses and your families is always important.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:09:30] And having the tools to get through that.

Winn Hardin: [00:09:31] Absolutely, absolutely. But I liked how he qualified it this year. He was like, “this isn’t going to be the 1930s. This is going to be the real estate bust from 2028, and it could be bad. Unemployment could get up to 25%, especially probably in unskilled positions, things like that, which will be hard.” But we saw that in the first year of Covid, too. We saw unemployment jump up like that when everything just shut down. And we survived.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:10:02] Yeah, we did. We’re still here.

Nino LaDuca: [00:10:05] That’s the takeaway.

Winn Hardin: [00:10:06] Okay, so as a global robotic systems integrator and global automation systems integrator… I mean, do you do some work outside of North America? Let me let me qualify that point.

Nino LaDuca: [00:10:15] Yeah we do. So our headquarters are in Auburn Hills, Michigan. We have two facilities in Michigan and one in Burlington, Ontario, Canada. We’re also just outside of Lille, France and Karlshamn, Sweden. Overall, the SPA group has 450 employees globally. So certainly several locations and wide-ranging customers throughout the globe.

Winn Hardin: [00:10:39] Yeah, cool. So you’ve got a great viewpoint on… Because the markets that we serve CPG, automotive, these are global markets, right? I mean, they’re all connected. The world is hyper-connected these days. You mentioned, Simon, earlier about castings being a bright spot in the space. And then you mentioned food, which wasn’t something that I was really aware you guys did a whole lot about. So, can we just shift to, where are the bright spots on the horizon in the next couple of years? What are the verticals? And, you know, any kind of technology or applications that are going to be relevant for that? I’d love to hear what your thoughts are.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:11:13] Yeah, there’s probably four main verticals: GI (general industry), which is growing, you know, with its labor shortage and people wanting to automate those processes. I’m going to park EV and what we call lightweighting for a while, but distribution. Distribution is growing massively—— you know, package handling and parcel handling, that type of thing. And the way we automate that, getting the human interface reduced and improving performance and throughput of those type of products. Then, as I said, the food space and… similar thing —— labor, people assembling prepared foods, for example, sandwiches, and handling corn dogs and things like that. And then a real bright spot we see in the market is life sciences, particularly in medical instruments, in the handling of vials, the handling of syringes, the sanitization of those type of products, just automating that whole process. It’s very similar to the food kind of business, but a different avenue, and we see a real growth in that area.

Winn Hardin: [00:12:26] And that’s still at the commercial level. When we talk about life sciences, we’re not talking about you guys moving into service robotics, right? Or doing installations—— do you do installations in hospitals? Usually they ship their their dirty stuff, their biohazards out for sterilizing, and then bring it back.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:12:44] So we’re at the producer end, the manufacturer end, where they’re taking their product and sterilizing it. So handling it in, handling it out. Very similar process to pick, pack, [palletizing].. Um, but, you know, working with the suppliers of sanitized equipment or the actual end-user of those products before they go into the medical phase.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:13:10] It’s something we’ve done in Europe for almost 20 years on a smaller scale. But the US market, the North American market, is growing massively. So we want to use our learnings from from Europe and bring them to North America.

Winn Hardin: [00:13:28] That’s a great thing. So can you tell us a little bit about food? Because I know, during the pandemic, food processing was even lower on the scale of automation adoption than general manufacturing, which has never been a nimble beast. It’s not like it’s a software designer in some sort of high-tech space. So can you talk to us a little bit about food? Is it food packaging or processing or both? And how are we seeing different growth from packaging versus processing? I’m assuming your water jets are used to actually carve organics in some cases?

Nino LaDuca: [00:14:04] We do. In some applications we do. And you know, I’ll let Simon answered this question, but I would say that, for us as a company, we took advantage… When Covid happened, there was a real shortage of labor going into that. But even more so. It was just amplified. And so, we would go to a lot of customers and a lot of customers would always want an ROI or some type of return on investment. After Covid, customers always said to us, “we can’t find individuals to work on second shift or third shift. We need automation.” So the game changed for us as a company, and our food processing or food automation business certainly just continued to rise since 2021, 2022.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:14:51] So what we saw was that massive growth. And you can see that in some of the industry trends in ’21, ’22. What we’re finding now is a slowdown. It’s not a it’s not a decline, but it’s a slowdown.

Winn Hardin: [00:15:03] Take a breath. When you’ve been running, you know, to the wall.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:15:06] Exactly. And those larger companies were beginning their automation journey. They invested heavily in ’21, ’22. Now they’re living with the technology and understanding the technology. And we fully expect that to grow again in ’25.

Winn Hardin: [00:15:20] There’s still plenty of room for growth adoption of automation in those industries.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:15:25] And, again, it’s not a recession. It’s just… it was not growing at the same rate of change in ’24 as it was in ’21, ’22, and ’23.

Winn Hardin: [00:15:33] Yeah, few people can be like China and grow at 10%-guaranteed every year for 20 years.

Nino LaDuca: [00:15:38] It’s amazing, right?

Winn Hardin: [00:15:40] But I think it’s just natural. Life is cyclical.

Nino LaDuca: [00:15:43] It is. Absolutely.

Winn Hardin: [00:15:44] We hope it’s not the semiconductor industry cycle, just boom or bust. But little humps are okay. So, in some of our ex-parte conversations, another area that you guys have mentioned and that was really exciting to me was aerospace, right? And for a number of reasons, these tend to be —— unless you’re doing, you know, painting material removal, which you’re probably involved in. But I’m wondering if aerospace is adapting it for riveting or for other types of applications? And that may not be right in your wheelhouse, but I’d love to pick your brain on that.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:16:14] Yeah. I mean, there’s all kinds of developing technology in terms of, you know, material removal or fastener implementation, not something we’re really focused on, but there are some huge developments coming from the robot manufacturers in terms of feedback devices and and knowing where the robot really is in space, that lends itself very well to those type of technologies. So it’s something we pay attention to. The areas of growth that we’ve seen are in the MRO —— maintenance, repair, and overhaul. So the engine manufacturers, as we’ve seen the new programs come online, like the LEAP engine that’s in the Airbus and Boeing —— although looking at the Boeing deliveries, pretty scary to see the decline —— but we know there’s a massive demand for new aircraft, so we’re not too concerned about that. But yeah, that’s been a growth technology. And then the components behind that, like I said, investment cast in exotic alloys like hastelloy, titanium, those type of materials. There’s a real need for the removal of the cast materials and processing those. So that’s something we’ve paid real attention to. And we expect that to be another growth node.

Winn Hardin: [00:17:21] That’s great to hear. The aerospace industry has been a mixed bag lately, especially if you’re in the US. Because, I mean, Boeing has been a benchmark company for this country for decades and decades, going back to the space program. And they’ve had so many hits on the chin, you know. And then we think about automation and you pair that with machine vision, and now you’ve got 100% inspection for everything, and when you combine it with 3D you can actually have… You know your quality. I mean, I’m sure they’re already using a lot of automated systems to validate assembly processes and steps. But if you could combine it with robotics and machine vision in the same work, it seems like it’s got to bring efficiencies.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:18:02] Absolutely. And total quality.

Winn Hardin: [00:18:05] So, logistics was another market… Was probably one of the fastest, hottest markets during the pandemic years.

Nino LaDuca: [00:18:12] Correct.

Winn Hardin: [00:18:13] Just massive amounts of growth. Everyone buying online, having it shipped to their house, and everything that led to that expansion. And logistics is still a growing industry today, right? It’s still a bright spot on the market right now. Are your customer profiles changing? I mean, you were at the top with maybe, you know, your Amazons, your Targets, the largest retailers, plus DHL FedEx, UPS, maybe there. But is it trickling down to where we’re seeing smaller distribution centers adopting automation?

Nino LaDuca: [00:18:44] I think so.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:18:45] Yeah, absolutely. So like everything we’ve kind of done at Shape Process Automation, we tend to be laser-focused on the areas of business we’re going after. We don’t want to be all things to all people. So we look very specifically in areas where we can add value, and it’s all about adding value as an integrator. If you don’t add value, you’re just the same as everybody.

Winn Hardin: [00:19:06] They’re not going to write that check.

Nino LaDuca: [00:19:07] Right.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:19:08] So, you know, looking at some of the ventures we’ve taken already with our customers, we’ve brought them kinds of automation. The next step for us is bringing robotic induction to our customers. We really think with AI, with the new vision technologies, which are changing rapidly… In the last 2 or 3 years, we’ve seen advancements, significant advancements. We want to have the right partners in that business to make sure that we can make that advancement. And our customers are very open to bringing that kind of technology to handling those packages once they’re out of the truck, into the line, in the cell, and back out of the facility again. So that’s something we’re looking heavily at.

Winn Hardin: [00:19:50] So are any of your solutions going to be mobile, meaning paired with AMR-type scenarios, or… Is there any thoughts on that? I’ve heard this might be the year of the AMR pedestal combination as everyone waits for humanoids, which is going to take a little while.

Nino LaDuca: [00:20:04] Yeah, I mean, we’re constantly looking at things and looking at new technology to integrate into our solutions for our customers. We haven’t yet, Winn, but it’s certainly something we’re looking at. And just going back to the logistics. You made the comment about Amazon. Absolutely, i think it has trickled down, because a lot of these people want to improve, you know, the way that they deliver their product or their services to the end customer. And so I think Amazon, or the likes of Amazon, certainly led the way for others to at least look into the type of solutions that we offer as well.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:20:36] Yeah. And again, to kind of echo Nino’s point, you know, we figure out the areas of business where we can reduce risk for our customers and reduce risk for our own company. You know, we want to be an innovator, but we also want to be cautious.

Winn Hardin: [00:20:52] Understood. You know, you’ve both mentioned a couple of times about having the right partnerships and being part of the right groups and specializing in doing what you do, do it extremely well, and then leverage collaboration. And collaboration has been kind of on my mind for the last couple of days. We’ve had a number of panels with robotic manufacturers and machine vision and… Here’s the question. Do you see the barriers for collaboration within our industrial automation market kind of falling a little bit? So that companies are more willing, realizing that their software must be able to interact, you know, with different platforms if we’re all going to succeed? Can you comment?

Nino LaDuca: [00:21:31] So if I understand the question correctly, you think that collaboration is going to be more effective or just increase? I 1,000% agree with you. 1,000% agree with you. I mean, if you look at… You know, we come to the A3 conference every year, we go to our our partners’ conferences every year. And I think they’re being very proactive in introducing us to other technology companies out there, because I think they see the benefit in all of us collaborating with one another and really pushing our solutions —— or everyone’s solutions —— within the industry. So I’m all for it and I do see it increasing.

Winn Hardin: [00:22:07] Awesome. I’m going to ask another one off the cuff if I can, if you guys don’t mind? We’re talking a lot about robot makers, and we were having a big discussion about, you know, China putting as many robot installations in in a month as the United States does in a year. Right? Are we seeing —— and you guys are in waterjet and you’re in a lot of other processes and automation tools. Is that the same deal? I mean, how does Europe, the United States, and Asia, how do they compare when it comes to you? Do you guys build most of everything in Europe and in North America? Any thoughts on that?

Simon Kenworthy: [00:22:39] Yeah, I mean, our manufacturing is in North America and Europe.

Nino LaDuca: [00:22:45] Made in America, baby.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:22:46] Made in America, absolutely. But we’re very much focused on where we can add value. So, whether it’s what we do with our partners or what we do with our networks, it’s like… It’s not a complicated business. We open up our networks. There’s plenty of work for everybody. And some of our best collaborators are our competitors. And, you know, events like this show that. We stand and talk and share ideas. A real growth part of our business is how we collaborate.

Winn Hardin: [00:23:21] It seems so important because, I mean, you could sit there and say, “everybody’s water jet is the same.” But that’s not true. There’re a lot of different capacities, capabilities, control systems, all the things that play into it. How do you connect with the ERP or MES systems? And every company is going to be… This company might have a larger software development company or this one might have, I don’t know, just more access to ERP systems or whatever the situation may be, or these guys are just hardware giants. So, I mean, it seems like everyone will get more business when we can design systems that are 100% accepted by our customers and the people who work there, meaning they’re the best in class, easiest to use. Right? They’re not going to be put into bypass mode for whatever the situation is or cause a lot of problems. Only productivity gains. And if we can make more customers happy, seems like everyone will make more money. And let’s be real, we’ve all still got lead times I think at this point.

Nino LaDuca: [00:24:17] Yeah. And getting back to your question about, you know, the volume, I guess, of robots. I mean, China’s got such a mass population. And I think what we’re starting to see in North America is, like Alan spoke of today, there is going to be even more of a labor shortage when all the GenXers retire and sort of go. So I just think there’s going to be more companies out there that are going to be forced to introduce robots or some type of automation into their process. And I think you’ll see a lot more installations in the future, right?

Winn Hardin: [00:24:47] So it’s going to be interesting to see whether this new administration here in the US kind of looks to what China has done. I mean, China supports the robot manufacturers with all kinds of support. I mean, you know, you see more of that in Germany and some other countries too, than we see here in the US. As well as the manufacturing companies. I mean, the US is never going to start subsidizing this large number of industries, but it’s interesting that China has looked at it from an input and output perspective, from the customer and supplier perspective, and just made a commitment that we will be the dominant player in robotic production, for example. It’ll be interesting to see whether, or how Europe and the US responds to that.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:25:30] And I think a lot of that comes into the collaborative robot space. You know I think the soundbite is, there’s 500 different manufacturers of collaborative robots in China. 500. I mean, that’s a huge number. We operate more in the industrial robot space, but we’re paying real attention to that space. And you talk about how this industry can be subsidized? It’s subsidized through automation. You know, the more we add, we reduce the overall cost to the consumer by adding that technology, improving the quality. It’s never going to be the cheapest place to manufacture anything, but it’s certainly the best country to manufacture something.

Winn Hardin: [00:26:09] It’s definitely my favorite place to be. But I had no idea… 500 cobot OEMs in China. I mean, that’s no market on earth that’s going to support that kind of diversity, so a little bit of artificial support there may not be the best thing at the end of the day. But I guess their unit costs are wicked low?

Simon Kenworthy: [00:26:26] Yeah, they’re crazy low.

Winn Hardin: [00:26:29] All right. It’s been great talking to you. Before I let you guys go and get back to making contacts here at the show… Nino, in your crystal ball, you got anything you’re particularly looking forward to in ’25?

Nino LaDuca: [00:26:40] Well, I mean, it’s interesting —— again, going back to what Alan said —— it’s going to be a pickup midway through the year. We’ve actually, when we submitted our 2025 budget, we took that into consideration. We knew the first half, first quarter and second quarter, would be relatively slow. And we’re starting to see signs of, I would say pickup of customers starting to invest their dollars again, or at least initiating projects again, which would be good for us.

Winn Hardin: [00:27:07] So you’d think you’d be at the planning stages right now and deep into communications, if, you know, commissioning is going to start in the second half of this year?

Nino LaDuca: [00:27:15] Certainly.

Winn Hardin: [00:27:16] How about you, Simon? What are you looking forward to?

Nino LaDuca: [00:27:18] So, what I’m really looking forward to is the commercial side of our businesses. We’re actively recruiting for rockstar, stud, business development folks. And I’m not going to be shy about that.

Nino LaDuca: [00:27:34] Don’t! You guys are hearing it. There’s opportunity here.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:27:37] The reason why we’ve been successful at Shape Process Automation is because of our commercial staff —— backed up, of course, by our manufacturing folks and all our back office. It’s all about our people. But we’re actively looking for high-quality individuals with good networks who are able to bring business immediately to us.

Nino LaDuca: [00:27:56] So that’s the plug. That’s a good plug. I mean, he made that one serious, right at the camera.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:28:02] Looking right in the camera. You can find me on LinkedIn. Yeah, Simon.Kenworthy@ShapeProcessAutomation.com.

Winn Hardin: [00:28:08] There you go. These two these two gentlemen are… Thank you so much for joining me today. They’re so easy to find! But if you can’t, you can always reach us through Manufacturing-Matters.com. Send us any questions that you might have for Nino and Simon, and we’ll make sure we get them to them ASAP. Thanks again for your time today.

Nino LaDuca: [00:28:28] Thanks for having us.

Winn Hardin: [00:28:29] It’s been a pleasure introducing you to the “Manufacturing Matters” audience and we’ll see you guys really soon on another episode. But until then, have a great day.

Simon Kenworthy: [00:28:36] Thanks, guys.