AMT is pleased to announce that Ryan Kelly has joined the organization to serve as general manager of AMT’s new San Francisco Tech Lab. The tech lab will be AMT’s first in the United States and will provide a variety of resources to jumpstart members’ business development and relationship-building with the manufacturing, technology, and investment communities in the Bay Area.
The lab will also serve as a co-location and collaboration space for both manufacturing and technology companies in the region. AMT’s goal is to facilitate collaboration between companies to co-develop new ideas and prototype, meet with VCs, and forge new connections to accelerate the development of market-driven products, solutions, and business models.
“Ryan has hit the ground running with a wealth of knowledge and experience around business strategy, the manufacturing and technology ecosystems, and the supply chain,” said Travis Egan, vice president of business development at AMT. “His presence in the Bay Area will greatly strengthen the AMT brand on the West Coast, helping to build a network in the Silicon Valley technology community and providing member support and new member development in this region.”
In addition to fostering collaboration, AMT will leverage its Silicon Valley presence to promote members and their products to technology companies in the region and develop relationships with the VC community and educate them about the diversity of AMT members and their products. Lastly, AMT will look to bring innovative new companies—both in manufacturing and technology—into the organization.
“We know there is a lot of interest in manufacturing technology by both technology companies and investors, but there are no well-orchestrated paths for bringing them into the ecosystem,” said Kelly. “AMT can be a valuable asset to them. Both communities have challenges and solutions that will benefit from the connection—whether it’s solutions that AMT members can provide or that AMT can provide. We see this as a big opportunity to help companies find the business connections that are optimal for them.”
Before joining AMT, Kelly served as senior product manager at Xometry, the largest marketplace for custom manufacturing in the United States. Earlier in his career, he served as director of product strategy at MakeTime Inc., an AMT member company, before it was acquired by Xometry in 2018. Both Xometry and MakeTime are software companies that served the manufacturing industry, and Kelly has straddled both industries for years.
The San Francisco Tech Lab and the upcoming MT360 conference being held in Santa Clara, Calif. on May 12-14, 2020 are both key elements of AMT’s lifecycle strategy around transformative technologies. MT360 will bring together the technology and manufacturing communities to showcase and demonstrate the integration of additive manufacturing, augmented reality, cognitive automation, and the digital thread into manufacturing operations. There is enormous opportunity for collaboration, learning, and investment between these two communities to accelerate product development.
