🔒Making Connections: New CONNEX website links state’s manufacturers and suppliers

Jill Mayer, CEO of Bead Industries, describes the last several years as “feast or famine” when it comes to securing supplies for her Milford-based manufacturing firm.

“Last year, we couldn’t get brass, but now we have more than we need for the next year,” said Mayer, who attributed her supply chain woes to the COVID-19 pandemic and its lingering aftermath. “It’s frustrating on either end.”

Now Mayer believes she’s found a solution: the recently inaugurated CONNEX Connecticut online platform. The site provides state manufacturers with quick and easy access to in-state suppliers and other manufacturers as well as a place for them to post and view RFPs and RFQs.

Membership is free thanks to a partnership between the state of Connecticut and the Connecticut Business and Industry Association.

Mayer says that CONNEX Connecticut has the potential to solve her supply chain problems. COVID and its fallout revealed that the firm had too few suppliers, she said.

“The primary reason for CONNEX is to develop long-term relationships with new suppliers,” Mayer said, whose firm makes electrical and plumbing parts and employs about 50 people. “Finding suppliers was extremely difficult for many of us (local manufacturers) these last two years. If I can access more (local) suppliers, then I think I’ll be less exposed to interruptions. CONNEX will make this easier for us.”

Mayer added that sourcing more supplies also has the potential to reduce costs and speed up delivery. While she expects to use the system mainly to secure supplies, it also may bring her new customers, she said.

“Hopefully costs will go down due to competition,” she said. “And it’s also transportation costs. If I have a supplier in Chicago, it’s going to take me longer to get (the item) and it’s going to cost more.”

That’s music to the ears of Paul Lavoie, the state’s chief manufacturing officer, who is urging state manufacturers to sign up for the service.

CONNEX Connecticut, which launched on Feb. 5, is part of the state’s strategy to support and expand Connecticut manufacturing, which remains the second largest sector of the state’s economy by GDP. The platform will not only ease manufacturers’ supply chain woes but also return supply chains to the state, creating even more new jobs and companies, Lavoie said.

“The purpose is to build an ecosystem in Connecticut where manufacturers can put their capacities and capabilities as well as their certifications and strengths and opportunities into a database so they can use that database to find each other,” he said.

The platform operates in 15 other states, and any firms that sign on by March 31 will get free access to those out-of-state databases as well, Lavoie said.

“This will be the single easiest business development decision that you make in your lifetime,” he said. “It’s a salesperson’s best friend.”

Lavoie credited CBIA, the state’s largest business organization, with bringing the idea to the state, and the two formed a partnership to make it happen. Lavoie said his office secured $606,000 from the state Manufacturing Innovation Fund to cover the platform’s cost for two years, enabling Connecticut to offer membership at no cost. CONNSTEP, which is affiliated with CBIA, will administer the program, Lavoie said.

Chris DiPentima, president and CEO of CBIA, praised the state’s willingness to partner with his organization to bring the platform to Connecticut.

“I’ve got to compliment the state on this,” DiPentima said. “This probably wouldn’t have happened without the public-private partnership. This is something that we continue to do a good job on in Connecticut: collaborate at the public and private level to bring business to our state.”

CBIA, DiPentima said, is the National Association of Manufacturers’ designee in Connecticut, and it was through them that the association learned of the platform.

Operated by a firm called i5 Services, the platform has been a success in other states where companies must pay for the service. CBIA wanted to bring the platform to Connecticut without a fee, and the key to doing so was the funding provided by the state, DiPentima said.

DiPentima noted that manufacturing, which has a long and rich history in Connecticut, remains a vital and vibrant state industry. About 20% of CBIA’s members are manufacturers and about 160,000 people work in the sector, he said. While behemoths like Pratt and Whitney, Electric Boat and Sikorsky may come to mind first, the average Connecticut manufacturing operation — there are about 4,400 — employs only about 25 workers, he said.

CONNEX Connecticut has been up and running for over a month, and signups are exceeding expectations, Lavoie and DiPentima said. In the first two weeks, more than 200 companies joined the platform, significantly more than the state’s most optimistic projections, they said. The state initially hoped to get 750 firms on the platform by year’s end, Lavoie said.

“I’m highly confident we’re going to blow the doors off that 750 number,” Lavoie said.

In addition to smaller manufacturers like Mayer’s Bead Industries, the state and CBIA hope to induce the state’s biggest manufacturers on board as well, according to Lavoie and DiPentima.

They’ve already had success: Aerospace company Kaman has joined, Lavoie said. In addition, Siemens Gamesa, part of the German industrial giant Siemens, has also signed on to the platform in search of suppliers for a large offshore wind turbine project it plans to build off New London, he said.

Mayer said that she has yet to do a deal through CONNEX Connecticut but has been going on the platform to get a feel for it. She is getting the rest of her team signed up and uploading videos and company information and materials.

After spending time on the platform, Mayer is confident it will help her business. While her focus is on using it to find new suppliers, she’s interested to see if it will also bring her new customers, especially ones seeking customized products, something her firm excels at.

“I’m very curious about whether we are going to use it to find suppliers or customers or both,” she said. “I think it can do both.”

Mayer also likes the underlying purpose of the platform, to encourage the return of supply chains to the state, creating greater stability for firms like hers and more jobs here.

“I like that shift and I think that CONNEX helps that shift,” she said.

Access the website at: portal.ct.gov/manufacturing/CONNEX.