Teacher wearing Face Shield in classroom

The Ohio Manufacturing Alliance

The Ohio Manufacturing Alliance, a public-private partnership, was created to repurpose and retool equipment to manufacture personal protective equipment (PPE) during the COVID19 pandemic. It consisted of a partnership between the Ohio Manufacturer’s Association, the Ohio Hospital Association, the Ohio Manufacturing Extension Program, JobsOhio and 1,600 responses from Ohio’s manufacturing community.

The Objective

What were you looking for in a solution?

KDI Technical Services’ goal was to identify a source of plastic film and precisely cut it to produce face shields during the pandemic for the OMA.

The Results

What was the reaction to KDI Technical Services production?

As this was a private-public partnership, the PPE was made for Ohio hospitals and front-line healthcare workers. These products were desperately needed, and the healthcare community was delighted and relieved that KDI Technical Services could support OMA with production.

“As a founding partner of the Ohio Manufacturing Alliance, the Ohio Manufacturing Extension Program (MAGNET) was tasked to produce PPE during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic but we had difficulty finding suppliers. The team at Kent Displays used their supply chain knowledge to secure a film supply and their manufacturing expertise to develop a production process and quickly started shipping product. Kent Displays’ creative solution to adapt both supply chain and manufacturing to make a new product in just a few weeks makes them unique. It was great working with the Kent Displays team to supply PPE to front line workers!”

-Dr. Ethan Karp, President and CEO, MAGNET