15 years ago the term Smart Manufacturing was coined as a shortened version of Smart (predictive, preventive and proactive), zero-incident, zero-emissions Manufacturing. This year is a singular moment in time to account for SM’s origins, celebrate (just a little) how far SM has progressed, and look forward to SM’s full impact now that its roots in AI have come full circle.”

Jim Davis

UCLA Vice Provost Emeritus, CESMII Program Oversight & Principal Investigator

On the 15th anniversary of Smart Manufacturing, co-founder Jim Davis celebrates the people, partnerships, and events that led to Smart Manufacturing as a national priority. The paper takes us from Smart Manufacturing’s beginnings, to how CESMII (the Clean Energy Smart Manufacturing Innovation Institute sponsored by DOE) came into being, and to CESMII as a key public-private partnership for catalyzing Smart Manufacturing’s broad impact on global competitiveness and environmental sustainability throughout U.S. manufacturing.