Detroit to U.S. "We're not dead yet!"

Publicity is growing, and word is spreading, that the skill set, drive and determination of Michigan workers is being repurposed toward exciting new economic opportunities.

Among the lastest to take notice: the online edition of the venerable New York Times. A recent article in the Business section of the web site ("In Detroit, Is There Life After the Big 3," www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/business/economy), highlights numerous examples of Detroit-area companies and workers finding new direction in emerging technologies and industries. Among those examples:

• A $1.5 billion extreme makover for a Ford plant in Wixom, MI. Two investors, Extreme Power of Austin, Texas, and Clairvoyant Energy of Santa Barbara, CA, plan to hire 4,000 workers by late next year to make solar panels and battery systems for utilities.
  
• General Electric's $100 million investment in a 1,000-employee research and manufacturing facility for wind turbines outside Detroit.
  
• $50 million in engineering projects at the Detroit campus of Ricardo Inc., a British engineering services firm, for products such as remote-piloted military aircraft, construction equipment and lithium-ion batteries.

Here's what these corporate investors from diverse sectors such as alternative energy, defense and green inintiatives all seem to agree on: 1) Plant facilities abandoned by the auto industry represent a bargain in both space and manufacturing equipment. 2) Michigan retains an impressive workforce of mechanical engineers, machinists and factory managers with skills that can only be acquired with years of shop-floor experience, not from a text book, and 3) The combination of industrial space and people accustom to hitting the highest production standards in the world represents a golden opportunity for application across a spectrum of advanced manufacturing activities.

Analysts caution that the full impact on Michigan's economic resurgence should be considered as a matter of scale. That is, many new initiatives are required to replace an estimated 216,000 jobs lost in the auto industry over the past 10 years. Moverover, the impact will take time to gauge as the state gathers statistics on revenue from industries such as clean technology and aerospace.

Communication will be key, to support the initiatives of employers that have already chosen Michigan as well as those making new decisions about where to locate facilities -- and to let the world know the state is indeed finding "life after the Big 3."

MI perspective: While other states, and the nation as a whole, grow primarily in businesses comprising the service economy, new applications for Michigan's manufacturing expertise could eventually make it a leader in industries that haven't even been invented yet. The outcome will be not only the return of a robust regional economy, but a diversified industrial base that is more resistant to economic recession.