MANUFACTURING 

EXTENSION 

PARTNERSHIP

Most Federal 

Spending Directly 

Supports Work with 

Manufacturers, but 

Distribution Could Be 

Improved

Report to Congressional Committees

March 2014

GAO-14-317

United States Government Accountability Office
United States Government Accountability Office

Highlights of GAO-14-317, a report to 

congressional committees

March 2014

MANUFACTURING EXTENSION PARTNERSHIP

Most Federal Spending Directly Supports Work with 

Manufacturers, but Distribution Could Be Improved

Why GAO Did This Study

Manufacturing plays a key role in the 

U.S. economy. Congress established 

the MEP program in NIST in 1988. The 

program’s objectives are to enhance 

productivity and technological 

performance and to strengthen the 

global competitiveness of target 

manufacturing firms, namely small and 

medium-sized U.S.-based firms. Under 

this program, NIST partners with 60 

nonfederal organizations called MEP 

centers. The centers, located in 50 

states and Puerto Rico, help target 

firms develop new customers and 

expand capacity, among other things. 

NIST awards federal funding to centers 

under annually renewed cooperative 

agreements, subject to the centers 

providing matching funds and receiving 

a positive performance evaluation. 

The Consolidated and Further 

Continuing Appropriations Act, 2013,

mandated GAO to report on MEP 

program administrative efficiency, 

which relates to funding provided to 

centers. This report (1) describes, over 

the past 5 years, how NIST spent 

federal MEP program funds and (2) 

examines the basis for NIST’s 

cooperative agreement award 

spending. To conduct this work, GAO 

analyzed obligations data, reviewed 

relevant legislation and policies, and 

interviewed NIST officials. 

What GAO Recommends

GAO recommends that Commerce’s 

spending on cooperative agreement 

awards be revised to account for 

variations across service areas in

demand for program services and in 

MEP centers’ costs of providing

services. Commerce agreed with 

GAO’s recommendation.

What GAO Found

Of the approximately $608 million spent by the Department of Commerce’s 

(Commerce) National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in fiscal 

years 2009 through 2013 on the Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) 

program, NIST used most of the funds to directly support MEP centers.

Specifically, NIST spent about $495 million on awards to centers and spent the 

rest on contracts, staff, agency-wide overhead charges, and other items, some of 

which NIST considered direct support and some of which NIST considered 

administrative spending. Although NIST is not required to track, and has not 

historically tracked, administrative spending, NIST officials told GAO the agency 

developed definitions of direct support and administrative spending in fiscal year 

2013 in response to congressional interest, then conducted an analysis of fiscal 

year 2013 federal MEP program spending using those definitions. NIST defines 

direct support spending as spending that directly supports the MEP center 

system’s work with manufacturing firms, such as awards to centers or contracts 

to train MEP center staff on how to quickly assess innovative ideas for new 

products. NIST considers all other spending to be administrative, including 

spending on performance evaluations for MEP centers or on agency-wide 

overhead fees that pay for facilities operations and maintenance at the NIST 

campus. Using these definitions, NIST estimated that about 88.5 percent of 

federal MEP program spending in fiscal year 2013 was for direct support, and the 

remaining 11.5 percent was for administration. 

NIST’s spending on cooperative agreement awards is based on the historical 

amount awarded to each center when it was established. This took into account 

each center’s identification of target manufacturing firms in its service area—

including characteristics such as business size, industry types, product mix, and 

technology requirements—and its costs of providing services to those firms. 

However, because NIST made the awards on an incremental basis to individual 

centers serving different areas over a period of more than 15 years, NIST’s 

awards did not take into account variations across service areas in the demand 

for program services—a function of the number and characteristics of target 

firms—or variations across service areas in costs of providing services. NIST’s 

cooperative agreement award spending is, therefore, inconsistent with the 

beneficiary equity standard. This standard—commonly used to design and 

evaluate funding formulas—calls for funds to be distributed in a way that takes 

these variations into account so that centers can provide the same level of 

services to each target manufacturing firm, according to its needs. Because NIST

did not account for these variations across service areas, NIST’s cooperative 

agreement award spending may not allow centers to provide the same level of 

services to target manufacturing firms, according to their needs. NIST officials 

told GAO that an analysis they recently conducted showed wide variation across 

centers in the relationship between their cooperative agreement award amounts 

and the number of target manufacturing firms in their service areas. NIST officials 

told GAO they are exploring ways to revise NIST’s cooperative agreement award 

spending to take into account variations across service areas in the number of 

target manufacturing firms, among other factors. The officials discussed various 

options they are considering, but they did not identify an option they had agreed 

to implement or a timeline for decision making and implementation.

View GAO-14-317. For more information, 

contact Frank Rusco at (202) 512-3841 or 

ruscof@gao.gov.
Page i GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

Letter 1

Background 4

Most of the $608.3 Million NIST Spent on the MEP Program in 

Fiscal Years 2009 through 2013 Directly Supported MEP 

Centers 8

NIST’s Cooperative Agreement Award Spending Is Inconsistent 

with Beneficiary Equity 15

Conclusions 21

Recommendation for Executive Action 21

Agency Comments 21

Appendix I List of Manufacturing Extension Partnership Centers, 2013 23

Appendix II Comments from the Department of Commerce 25

Appendix III GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments 27

Table

Table 1: Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) Program 

Spending, Fiscal Years 2009-2013 14

Figures

Figure 1: Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program Cost 

Share 3

Figure 2: Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program 

Spending, Fiscal Year 2013 9

Figure 3: Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program 

Organizational Chart Showing Direct Support and 

Administrative Staff 13

Contents
Page ii GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

Abbreviations

DVIRC Delaware Valley Industrial Resource Center

E-CAR Expansion of Services Cooperative

Agreement Recipients

E3 economy, energy, and environment

GDP gross domestic product

IT information technology

MEP Manufacturing Extension Partnership 

NBS National Bureau of Standards

NIST National Institute of Standards and Technology

OMB Office of Management and Budget

T-CAR Tool Development Cooperative 

Agreement Recipients

This is a work of the U.S. government and is not subject to copyright protection in the 

United States. The published product may be reproduced and distributed in its entirety 

without further permission from GAO. However, because this work may contain 

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necessary if you wish to reproduce this material separately.
Page 1 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

441 G St. N.W.

Washington, DC 20548

March 27, 2014

The Honorable Barbara Mikulski

Chairwoman

The Honorable Richard Shelby

Ranking Member

Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies

Committee on Appropriations

United States Senate

The Honorable Frank Wolf

Chairman

The Honorable Chaka Fattah

Ranking Member

Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies

Committee on Appropriations

House of Representatives

Manufacturing plays a key role in the U.S. economy. According to the

Bureau of Economic Analysis, manufacturing generated $1.9 trillion in 

gross domestic product (GDP)—or almost 12 percent of total U.S. GDP—

in 2012, the most recent year for which data are available. In addition, the 

manufacturing sector employed almost 12 million workers in July 2013 

according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. To support U.S. 

manufacturing, Congress has established a variety of tax preferences, 

subsidies, and other programs,1 including the Hollings Manufacturing 

Extension Partnership (MEP) program. The MEP program was authorized 

by the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 and is 

administered by the Department of Commerce’s National Institute of 

Standards and Technology (NIST).2

 1

See GAO, Global Manufacturing: Foreign Government Programs Differ in Some Key 

Respects from Those in the United States, 

The program’s objectives are to 

enhance the productivity and technological performance and to 

strengthen the global competitiveness of target manufacturing firms, 

namely small and medium-sized manufacturing firms (with fewer than 500 

GAO-13-365 (Washington, D.C.: July 25, 

2013).

2

Pub. L. No. 100-418 § 5121(a) (Aug. 23, 1988)(codified at 15 U.S.C. § 278k).
Page 2 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

employees) based in the United States, helping these firms create and 

retain jobs.3

The MEP program operates through a network of 60 nonfederal 

organizations—called MEP centers—located throughout the United 

States and in Puerto Rico. MEP centers enter into contracts with 

manufacturing firms under which the centers deliver technical assistance 

to improve the firms’ manufacturing processes and productivity; expand 

their capacity; and help them adopt new technologies, utilize best 

management practices, and accelerate company growth. NIST enters into 

cooperative agreements with each MEP center under which federal 

funding is awarded to the center conditional upon the center providing 

matching funds and receiving a positive performance evaluation;4 these 

agreements are renewed annually.5 Once established, a MEP center 

must obtain two-thirds of its budget from nonfederal sources, such as 

state or local governments or user fees collected from manufacturing 

firms, to receive a one-third federal funding match.6

 3

For a comparison of the MEP program to the Trade Adjustment Assistance for Firms 

program, see GAO, Trade Adjustment Assistance: Commerce Program Has Helped 

Manufacturing and Services Firms, but Measures, Data, and Funding Formula Could 

Improve, 

(See fig. 1.) NIST has 

GAO-12-930 (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 13, 2012), 47-49.

4

According to the 2013 General Terms and Conditions of the program, NIST is to conduct 

a performance evaluation annually that focuses on each center’s alignment with the 

program’s overall objectives, resource expenditures, activities planned for the next year, 

and any proposed changes to the center’s budget, among other things. The results of this 

evaluation are to be incorporated into the center’s project plan or budget. In every other 

year this evaluation takes the form of an independent Merit Review Panel, in which private 

experts—not connected with the center being reviewed—assess the center’s 

performance.

5

Cooperative agreements are very much like grants in that they are used to transfer 

something of value to the recipient in order to accomplish a public purpose as authorized 

by law. The key difference between cooperative agreements and grants is that the federal 

agency providing the assistance has more involvement with the recipient in carrying out 

the activity being funded under a cooperative agreement than it does in the case of a 

grant. Cooperative agreements and grants differ from procurement contracts in that a 

procurement contract is to be used by an agency when the principal purpose is to acquire 

property or services for the direct benefit or use of the United States government, as 

opposed to when the principal purpose is to provide assistance to accomplish a public 

purpose as authorized by law.

6

When MEP centers are being established—during the first 4 years of their operation—

they receive a larger proportion of federal funds. For more information on the MEP 

program cost share, see GAO, Factors for Evaluating the Cost Share of Manufacturing 

Extension Partnership Program to Assist Small and Medium-Sized Manufacturers, 

GAO-11-437R (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 4, 2011).
Page 3 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

also awarded competitive grants to some MEP centers in recent years in 

addition to their annual cooperative agreement funding.

Figure 1: Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program Cost Share

This engagement responds to a mandate in the explanatory statement 

accompanying the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations 

Act, 2013 directing GAO to report to the House and Senate 

Appropriations Committees, Subcommittees on Commerce, Justice, 

Science, and Related Agencies on the extent to which the MEP program 

achieves administrative efficiencies, which relates to funding provided to 

centers. Our objectives for this review were to (1) describe, over the past 

5 years, how NIST spent federal MEP program funds and (2) examine the 

basis for NIST’s cooperative agreement award spending.

To describe how NIST spent federal MEP program funds over the past 5 

years, we obtained and analyzed obligations data from NIST for fiscal 

years 2009 through 2013. For the purposes of this report, we are 

measuring spending based on obligations. We interviewed 

knowledgeable agency officials about the sources of the data and the 

controls NIST had in place to maintain the integrity of the data, and we 

determined that the data were sufficiently reliable for the purposes of our 

report. We also reviewed a NIST analysis of fiscal year 2013 spending 

that estimated the amount NIST spent for direct support of the MEP 
Page 4 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

center system’s work with manufacturing firms and the amount NIST 

spent for administration. We interviewed agency officials about the 

analysis and independently reviewed their determinations of 

administrative and direct support spending, and we determined the 

resulting estimates were sufficiently reliable for the purposes of our 

report. In addition, we reviewed relevant laws—including the MEP 

program’s enabling legislation, implementing regulations, and annual 

appropriations—and program policies and procedures concerning how 

NIST spends the federal program funds. We also reviewed relevant 

documents, such as strategic plans, performance reports, budget 

justifications, and excerpts of contracts, and we interviewed NIST officials 

about how they spent the funds. To examine the basis for NIST’s 

cooperative agreement award spending, we interviewed NIST officials 

and reviewed MEP program data for fiscal years 2009 through 2013 to 

determine how NIST establishes cooperative agreement awards. We 

reviewed all federal funding opportunity announcements for the 

establishment of MEP center cooperative agreements published since the 

program’s inception, which define the criteria used to establish 

cooperative agreement awards. We assessed NIST’s basis for 

cooperative agreement award spending against equity standards from 

social science research for designing and evaluating funding formulas.

We conducted this performance audit from July 2013 to March 2014 in 

accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. 

Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain 

sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our 

findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that 

the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and 

conclusions based on our audit objectives.

The MEP program traces its origins to the Manufacturing Technology 

Centers Program,7

 7

In 1998, the program was renamed the Manufacturing Extension Partnership program. In 

2004, the program was redesignated the Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership in 

honor of Senator Fritz Hollings.

which was established by NIST’s predecessor, the 

National Bureau of Standards (NBS). In July 1988, NBS published the 

first of 12 federal funding opportunity announcements that have been 

Background
Page 5 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

issued to date for the establishment of MEP centers.8

The original legislation authorizing the MEP program emphasized the 

transfer of advanced technologies developed within NIST and other 

federal laboratories to small and medium-sized manufacturing firms. As 

we reported in 1991, however, the centers soon found that firms primarily 

needed proven, not advanced, technologies because advanced 

technologies were generally expensive, untested, and too complex to be 

practical for most small manufacturing firms.

That 

announcement led to the establishment of the first 3 centers in 1989, as 

part of an initial pilot program. By 1990, NBS had become NIST, and the 

agency published the second federal funding opportunity announcement 

for the establishment of two additional centers, bringing the total number 

of centers to 5. In 1992, NIST announced a federal funding opportunity for 

2 more centers, bringing the total to 7. The number of centers grew 

rapidly thereafter, with a nationwide network of 44 centers in place by 

1995. NIST has since added to its network and, as of 2013, has 60 

centers that cover all 50 states and Puerto Rico. Appendix I provides a list 

of the 60 MEP centers.

9 We reported, therefore, that 

a key mandate of the program was not realistically aligned with the basic 

needs of most small manufacturing firms. In recognition of this situation, 

NIST reoriented the program to focus on basic technologies that 

permitted firms to improve their competitive position. By the time we 

reported on the program in 1996, centers were providing a wide range of 

business services, including helping companies solve individual 

manufacturing problems, obtain training for their workers, create 

marketing plans, and upgrade their equipment and computers.10

More recently, the program’s focus has evolved to an emphasis on 

enhancing manufacturing firms’ innovative capacity. NIST calls this its 

 8

See 53 Fed. Reg. 27060 (July 18, 1988), 55 FR 38280 (Sept. 17, 1990), 57 FR 1725 

(Jan. 15, 1992), 60 FR 29827 (June 6, 1995), 61 FR 20242 (May 6,1996), 65 FR 41634 

(July 6, 2000), 66 FR 15219 (Mar. 16, 2001), 68 FR 12890 (Mar. 18, 2003), 75 FR 6355 

(Feb. 9, 2010), 77 FR 12563 (Mar. 1, 2012), 77 FR 37653 (June 22, 2012), and 78 FR 

21109 (Apr. 9, 2013). Some of these announcements were to establish new centers, and 

some were to reestablish centers where existing centers had closed.

9

GAO, Technology Transfer: Federal Efforts to Enhance the Competitiveness of Small 

Manufacturers, GAO/RCED-92-30 (Washington, D.C.: Nov. 22, 1991).

10GAO, Manufacturing Extension Program: Manufactures’ Views about Delivery and 

Impact of Services, GAO/GGD-96-75 (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 14, 1996).
Page 6 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

Next Generation Strategy and, in December 2008, NIST released its 

current strategic plan referred to by that name. The plan articulates 

NIST’s new vision for the program as a catalyst for accelerating 

manufacturing’s transformation into a “more efficient and powerful engine 

of innovation driving economic growth and job creation.”11

• Continuous Improvement. This area includes enhancing 

manufacturing firms’ productivity and freeing up their capacity to 

provide them a stable foundation to pursue innovation and growth 

through services and programs that target manufacturing plant 

efficiencies.

The plan also 

defines the program’s mission: “to act as a strategic advisor to promote 

business growth and connect manufacturing firms to public and private 

resources essential for increased competitiveness and profitability.” The 

plan focuses the program’s activities around the following five strategic 

areas:

• Technology Acceleration. This area includes developing tools and 

services to bring new product and process improvement opportunities 

to manufacturing firms, accelerating firms’ opportunities to leverage 

and adopt technology, connecting firms with technology opportunities 

and solutions, and making available a range of product development 

and commercialization assistance services.

• Supplier Development. This area includes developing and delivering 

the national capacity, tools, and services needed to put suppliers in a 

position to thrive in existing and future global supply chains.

• Sustainability. This area includes helping companies gain a 

competitive edge by reducing environmental costs and impact by 

developing new environmentally focused materials, products, and 

processes to gain entry into new markets.

• Workforce. This area includes developing and delivering training and 

workforce assistance to manufacturing firms, as well as expanding 

partnerships and collaborations to develop and deliver tools and 

services to foster the development of progressive managers and 

entrepreneurial CEOs.

 11NIST, The Future of the Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership (Gaithersburg, 

Md.: December 2008).
Page 7 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

MEP centers work with manufacturing firms to plan and implement 

projects in these and other areas. For example, in 2011, the Delaware 

Valley Industrial Resource Center (DVIRC)—a MEP center in 

Pennsylvania—worked with a manufacturing firm in Hatfield, 

Pennsylvania, on a continuous improvement project when the company 

faced price increases from its vendors it did not want to pass on to its 

customers. DVIRC trained company staff on methods to achieve 

efficiencies and helped identify areas for improvement in the company’s 

production process, resulting in increased productivity and reduced 

inventory levels that allowed the company to save space and lower costs, 

as reported by the manufacturing firm. Similarly, the Texas MEP center 

worked with a manufacturing firm in El Paso, Texas, on a sustainability 

project in 2013. The MEP center and the firm partnered with New Mexico 

State University’s Institute for Energy and the Environment on an 

economy, energy, and environment (E3) project that included training and 

an effort to identify inefficiencies in the manufacturing process. As a result 

of this partnership, the firm reported saving 40,000 gallons of water and 

reducing solid waste by 56 tons, among other accomplishments.

NIST has recently begun developing a new strategic planning process for 

the MEP program to update its Next Generation Strategy. According to 

NIST officials, the process will include extensive participation by 

stakeholders, including MEP centers. NIST expects to implement the 

planning process through the spring of 2014 and release an updated 

strategic plan shortly after the planning process is complete.

The program has also evolved in its matching fund requirements. The 

program as originally implemented provided federal funding to reimburse 

each $1 of nonfederal contributions with no more than $1 of federal 

funding—referred to as a 1:1 cost share—for the first 3 years that a 

center operated. For the fourth year of operation, every $3 of nonfederal 

contributions were reimbursed with $2 of federal funding—referred to as a 

3:2 cost share. For the fifth and sixth years of operation, every $2 of 

nonfederal contributions were reimbursed with $1 of federal funding—

referred to as a 2:1 cost share. Under the original legislation, federal 

funding was scheduled to end once a center had operated for 6 years. 

The 6-year federal funding limit was temporarily suspended by the fiscal 

year 1997 and 1998 appropriations acts and was eliminated in 1998 when 

Congress passed legislation12

 12Pub. L. No. 105-309 § 2 (October 1998) (codified at 15 U.S.C. § 278k(c)(5)). 

changing the program to, among other 
Page 8 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

things, provide for continued federal funding and set the cost share at 2:1 

for all centers that had been in operation for at least 6 years.13

NIST spent $608.3 million in federal funding on the MEP program in fiscal 

years 2009 through 2013 and used most of these funds to directly support 

MEP centers and their work with manufacturing firms. Specifically, NIST 

spent $494.6 million on cooperative agreement awards and competitive 

grant awards to MEP centers, which NIST considers to be direct support. 

NIST spent $78 million for contracts, and for NIST staff salaries and 

benefits, some of which NIST considers direct support and some 

administrative spending. The remaining $35.7 million was spent for 

agency-wide overhead charges and travel, training, performance awards, 

and other items, all of which NIST considers administrative spending. 

NIST defines direct support as spending that directly supports the MEP 

center system’s work with manufacturing firms, such as awards to centers 

or spending on training for MEP center staff. NIST considers all other 

spending to be administrative, including spending on performance 

evaluations of centers and on agency-wide overhead charges that pay for 

facilities operations and maintenance at the NIST campus.

NIST is not required to track, and historically has not tracked, 

administrative spending, but NIST officials told us the agency developed 

its definitions of direct support and administrative spending in fiscal year 

2013 in response to congressional interest. It then conducted an analysis 

of fiscal year 2013 federal MEP program spending using those definitions. 

NIST estimated that about 88.5 percent of federal MEP program spending 

in fiscal year 2013 was for direct support, and the remaining 11.5 percent 

was administrative. (See fig. 2.)

 13Some centers may still be subject to a lower cost share because they have been in 

operation for less than 5 years.

Most of the $608.3 

Million NIST Spent

on the MEP Program 

in Fiscal Years 2009 

through 2013 Directly 

Supported MEP 

Centers
Page 9 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

Figure 2: Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program Spending, Fiscal Year 2013
Page 10 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

It is not possible to determine whether NIST’s amount of administrative 

spending is appropriate because there is no standard definition of 

administrative spending for federal programs. In addition, conducting the 

analysis using different definitions could produce different results.

NIST spent $471 million on MEP center cooperative agreement awards in 

fiscal years 2009 through 2013. NIST considers all of this spending direct 

support. Federal funds for center cooperative agreements can be used by 

MEP centers for capital and operating and maintenance expenses. As 

stated earlier, these funds are awarded contingent on each MEP center 

meeting its cost-share requirement and having positive performance 

evaluations. NIST officials told us that spending on cooperative 

agreements and spending on staff salaries and benefits are NIST’s top 

spending priorities.

In fiscal years 2009 through 2013, NIST spent $23.6 million on awards to 

centers that were granted on a competitive basis. These awards are 

made in addition to cooperative agreement awards. The bulk of these 

awards went to two competitive grant programs; about $12.7 million was 

awarded to MEP centers through the Expansion of Services Cooperative 

Agreement Recipients (E-CAR) competition, and about $7.3 million was 

awarded through the Tool Development Cooperative Agreement 

Recipients (T-CAR) competition. NIST also awarded a small amount 

through grant competitions conducted under two other programs: the 

Advanced Manufacturing Jobs and Innovation Accelerator Challenge, and 

Spending on MEP Center 

Cooperative Agreements

Spending on MEP Center 

Competitive Grants

Defining Administrative Expenses

There is no standard definition of administrative expenses for federal 

programs. Executive Order 12837, issued on February 10, 1993, 

called on the Director of the Office of Management and Budget 

(OMB) to establish a definition of administrative expenses for 

agencies, but OMB did not develop a definition. Definitions and 

reporting of administrative expenses vary across public and private 

entities depending on their mission, priorities, services, clients, and 

on the purposes for which management needs the information. 
Page 11 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

the Energy-Efficient Buildings Hub project.14

In fiscal years 2009 through 2013, NIST spent $45.9 million on contracts 

for goods or services, some of which directly supported MEP centers and 

some of which were administrative. Of the $8 million spent on such 

contracts in fiscal year 2013, NIST estimated that it spent $5 million on 

direct support contracts and $3 million on administrative contracts. The 

contracts that NIST considered direct support in fiscal year 2013 were for 

training and support for MEP centers on tools that centers could use to 

assist manufacturing firms, or for work with centers on implementing MEP 

initiatives. For example, NIST awarded a $3.7 million contract to 

International Management and Consulting, LLC, to provide training for 

MEP center staff on innovation engineering, which NIST describes as a 

business support service that informs companies how to quickly assess

innovative ideas resulting in new business models, processes, and 

products. The training is intended to help MEP center staff provide 

guidance in these areas to clients. Contracts that NIST considered 

administrative in fiscal year 2013 were for services related to performance 

evaluations of MEP centers, telephone and mobile broadband, 

information technology (IT), and other products and services.

According to NIST officials, 

the competitive grants that it awarded under the four programs encourage 

projects in the five strategic areas identified in the MEP program’s 

strategic plan. For example, NIST awards to MEP centers through the ECAR competition funded 14 projects designed to integrate two or more of 

the five strategic areas, and NIST awards through the T-CAR competition 

funded 8 projects aimed at addressing the new and emerging needs of 

manufacturing firms in any of the strategic areas.

According to NIST officials, some of these contracts helped the program 

meet legal requirements, such as for services related to performance 

evaluations of MEP centers, which are required by the program’s 

enabling legislation and implementing regulations. Other contracts 

 14The Advanced Manufacturing Jobs and Innovation Accelerator Challenge and the 

Energy-Efficient Buildings Hub are joint programs with other agencies. The Advanced 

Manufacturing Jobs and Innovation Accelerator Challenge is a partnership among NIST 

and the Economic Development Administration within the Department of Commerce, the 

Department of Energy, the Department of Labor’s Employment and Training 

Administration, the Small Business Administration, and the National Science Foundation. 

The Energy-Efficient Buildings Hub project is a multiagency effort involving NIST and the 

Economic Development Administration, the Small Business Administration, and the 

Departments of Energy, Labor, and Education. 

Spending on Contracts
Page 12 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

supported areas of the program’s strategic plan, such as the contracts for 

MEP center staff training. Finally, some of the contracts were for 

operational functions, such as the contracts for telephone and mobile 

broadband and IT. NIST staff told us the program is currently reviewing all 

large direct support contracts with the intent of reducing contract 

spending and directing more funds to MEP centers. They expect the 

review to be complete in spring 2014.

NIST spent $32.1 million on staff salaries and benefits in fiscal years 

2009 through 2013. As of fiscal year 2013, NIST employed 55 staff under 

the MEP program. According to NIST’s definitions, some of its staff 

directly supported MEP centers, and some were administrative. In fiscal 

year 2013, NIST estimated that it spent $2.9 million on direct support 

staff, and $4.4 million on administrative staff. As shown in figure 3, the 

direct support staff worked in NIST’s strategic partnerships team, as well 

as in its program development and system operations offices for the MEP 

program. In NIST’s 2013 analysis of administrative spending, NIST 

considered the strategic partnerships and program development staff to 

be entirely dedicated to directly supporting MEP centers, and the system 

operations staff to be half dedicated to directly supporting MEP centers 

and half dedicated to program administration. NIST considered the other 

six units and teams in the MEP program to be dedicated to program 

administration, including the Director and the administration and finance 

team. NIST officials told us that they increased spending for staff salaries 

and benefits during the past 5 years, in part to return the program’s 

staffing level to that before substantial budget cuts in fiscal year 2004. 

New hiring focused on staff with expertise in areas of the program’s 

strategic plan, according to these officials.

Spending on Staff Salaries

and Benefits
Page 13 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

Figure 3: Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program Organizational Chart Showing Direct Support and Administrative 

Staff
Page 14 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

NIST spent $30.6 million in federal MEP program funds in fiscal years 

2009 through 2013 on agency-wide overhead required by NIST. NIST 

considers this spending to be administrative. NIST does not receive an 

appropriation for the costs of agency-wide general administration; instead 

it levies surcharges on programs to pay overhead costs, including the 

operation and maintenance of facilities, grants management, and mail 

distribution.

NIST spent the remainder of its federal funds—$5.1 million in fiscal years 

2009 through 2013—on travel, training, staff performance awards, and 

other items. NIST considers all of this spending to be administrative. 

According to NIST’s travel tracking spreadsheet, fiscal year 2013 travel 

included participation in on-site panel reviews of MEP centers, 

attendance at MEP center board meetings, and attendance at meetings 

with state and federal partners, among other things. Officials told us 

training funds are used for continuing education and professional training 

for MEP program staff, as opposed to training for MEP center staff. For 

example, some program staff hold professional credentials, such as a 

Contracting Officer Technical Representative, which require periodic 

training to be maintained. Performance award spending is used for 

discretionary bonuses and cash awards paid to MEP program staff for 

performance and to NIST staff outside the program, such as legal 

counsel, for exemplary support of the program.

Table 1 summarizes the spending described above.

Table 1: Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) Program Spending, Fiscal 

Years 2009-2013

Dollars in millions

Category Spending

Direct support or administrative 

spending

Cooperative agreement awards to 

MEP centers

$471.0 Direct support

Competitive grant awards to MEP 

centers

23.6 Direct support

NIST contracts 45.9 Mix of direct support and administrative

NIST staff salaries and benefits 32.1 Mix of direct support and administrative

NIST overhead charges 30.6 Administrative

Travel, training, performance 

awards, and other items

5.1 Administrative

Total $608.3

Source: GAO analysis of NIST data.

Spending on Agency-Wide 

Overhead

Spending on Travel, Training, 

Performance Awards, and 

Other Items
Page 15 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

NIST’s spending on cooperative agreement awards is based on the 

historical amount awarded to each center when it was established. This 

took into account each center’s identification of target manufacturing firms 

in its service area—including characteristics such as business size, 

industry types, product mix, and technology requirements—and its costs 

of providing services to those manufacturing firms. However, because 

NIST made the awards on an incremental basis to individual centers 

serving different areas over a period of more than 15 years, NIST’s 

awards to individual centers did not take into account variations across 

different service areas in the demand for program services—a function of 

the number and characteristics of target manufacturing firms—or 

variations across different service areas in costs of providing services. 

NIST’s cooperative agreement award spending is, therefore, inconsistent 

with the beneficiary equity standard.15

 15The beneficiary equity standard is commonly used in social science research to design 

and evaluate funding formulas. See, for example, GAO, Medicaid: Alternative Measures 

Could Be Used to Allocate Funding More Equitably, 

This standard—which is commonly 

used in social science research to design and evaluate funding 

formulas—calls for funds to be distributed in a way that takes these 

variations into account so that centers can provide the same level of 

services to each target manufacturing firm, according to its needs. 

Because NIST did not account for these variations across service areas, 

NIST’s cooperative agreement award spending may not allow centers to 

provide the same level of services to target manufacturing firms, 

according to their needs. NIST officials told us that an analysis they 

recently conducted showed a wide variation across centers in the 

relationship between their cooperative agreement award amounts and the 

number of target manufacturing firms in their service areas. NIST officials 

told us they are exploring ways to revise NIST’s cooperative agreement 

GAO-13-434 (Washington, D.C.: May 

10, 2013); GAO, Trade Adjustment Assistance: Commerce Program Has Helped 

Manufacturing and Services Firms, but Measures, Data, and Funding Formula Could 

Improve, GAO-12-930 (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 13, 2012);GAO, Vocational Rehabilitation 

Funding Formula: Options for Improving Equity in State Grants and Considerations for 

Performance Incentives, GAO-09-798 (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 30, 2009); GAO, Maternal 

and Child Health: Block Grant Funds Should Be Distributed More Equitably, 

GAO/HRD-92-5 (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 2, 1992); RAND Corporation, Review and 

Evaluation of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Block Grant Allotment 

Formula, MR-533-HHS/DPRC, 1997; National Research Council, Statistical Issues in 

Allocating Funds by Formula, Panel on Formula Allocations, Thomas A. Louis, Thomas B. 

Jabine, and Marisa A. Gerstein, ed., Committee on National Statistics, (Washington, D.C.: 

2003).

NIST’s Cooperative 

Agreement Award 

Spending Is 

Inconsistent with 

Beneficiary Equity
Page 16 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

award spending to take into account variations across service areas in 

the number of target manufacturing firms, among other factors.

NIST’s spending on cooperative agreement awards is based on the 

historical amount awarded to each center when it was established. Most 

of the currently operating centers were established between 1989 and 

1996, according to our analysis of NIST data estimating the establishment 

dates of current centers.16 When the centers were established, their 

original award amounts were based on the proposals that they submitted 

in response to NIST’s federal funding opportunity announcements. For all 

but the first federal funding opportunity announcement, NIST specified 

that it would evaluate proposals by assigning scores to the following 

equally weighted criteria:17

• Identification of target firms in the proposed region. The proposals had 

to demonstrate an understanding of the service area’s manufacturing 

base, including concentration of industry, business size, industry 

types, product mix, and technology requirements, among other things.

• Technology resources. The proposals had to assure strength in 

technical personnel and programmatic resources, full-time staff, 

facilities, equipment, and linkages to external sources of technology, 

among other things.

• Technology delivery mechanisms. The proposals had to define an 

effective methodology for delivering advanced manufacturing 

technology to manufacturing firms, among other things.

• Management and financial plan. The proposals had to define a 

management structure and assure management personnel to carry 

out development and operation of an effective center, among other 

things.

• Budget. The proposals had to contain a detailed 1-year budget and 

budget outline for subsequent years, among other things.

 16NIST could not provide us with documentation to substantiate its estimates of when

most centers’ received their original cooperative agreement awards. NIST officials stated 

that NIST’s record retention requirements do not require it to maintain files for cooperative 

agreements awarded in the early to mid-1990s.

17Prior to April 2013, the prospective center’s budget was evaluated as part of the fourth 

criterion, management and financial plan, rather than as a separate, equally weighted fifth 

criterion.

NIST’s Cooperative 

Agreement Award 

Spending Is Based on 

Historical Practice
Page 17 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

For funding opportunity announcements that NIST published after it 

issued its 2008 strategic plan, these criteria were to be discussed in the 

context of the proposer’s ability to align the proposal with the program’s 

strategic objectives. The announcements stated that, after scoring the 

proposals, NIST would select award recipients based upon their score 

ranking and other factors such as availability of federal funds and the 

need to assure appropriate regional distribution.

After centers were established, their subsequent cooperative agreement 

awards have remained at the historical amount when they were renewed 

each year.18 According to NIST officials, in some instances, centers’

cooperative agreements are not renewed and are instead opened to 

recompetition; during fiscal years 2009 to 2013, eight cooperative 

agreements were opened to recompetition.19

 18Renewals are contingent upon positive performance evaluations in accordance with 15 

C.F.R. § 290.8, taking into account various factors including, as of 2012, whether the 

center meets the following five qualitative metrics related to the program’s strategic plan: 

(1) the center has an actionable and measurable strategy that is built with purposeful 

alignment to the MEP program’s strategic plan; (2) the center maintains an appropriately 

balanced portfolio of products and services that address all strategic areas; (3) the center 

is able and willing to experiment with and adopt new products and services, and has 

adopted a culture of continuous learning and development; (4) the center works with 

proactive clients and restarts reactive clients, and creates a sense of urgency that 

transitions reactive clients to proactive; and (5) the center is willing and able to write 

success stories that reflect a mix of the strategic plan areas regularly and on-time.

NIST officials told us that 

recompetitions typically occur because the existing center has voluntarily 

closed or the organization has decided its mission no longer supports 

running a MEP center. According to NIST’s funding opportunity 

announcements, NIST used the same evaluation criteria discussed above 

to select new centers and establish their awards. Unlike renewed 

cooperative agreement awards, which remain at the historical amount 

each year, recompeted awards are based on, but can be greater than, the 

historical amount. NIST officials told us that they use the historical 

19During fiscal years 2009 to 2013, NIST officials told us the following centers’ cooperative 

agreements were opened to recompetition: the MEP center serving Arizona in fiscal years 

2009 and 2012, the centers serving the Chicago region of Illinois and central Pennsylvania 

in fiscal year 2010, the centers serving Rhode Island, Maryland, and Kentucky in fiscal 

year 2012, and the center serving Nebraska in fiscal year 2013. In five of these eight 

instances, the existing centers faced financial difficulties that made them unviable and 

caused them to voluntarily shut down. In the other three instances, the centers decided 

that their respective organizational missions no longer supported the operation of a MEP 

center and, as a result, each of these organizations voluntarily ended their respective 

MEP cooperative agreement.
Page 18 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

amounts as a baseline in establishing the recompeted award amounts, 

but they may make additional funding available for the recompetitions. 

This was the case for all but one of the eight recompetitions that took 

place during fiscal years 2009 to 2013. According to NIST officials, during 

these years, NIST reserved additional funds for seven of the

recompetitions to accommodate compelling proposals such as those that 

identified increased matching funds or broadened the work historically 

done in the service area. All but one of those seven recompetitions led to 

award amounts greater than the historical amount.

In addition to renewing existing awards and recompeting awards when a 

center has closed, NIST officials told us that NIST recently added a new 

center to the nationwide system and based the new award on the 

historical amount awarded for the area. Specifically, in 2012, a new 

center was added in South Dakota. Previously, the MEP center located in 

North Dakota served both North and South Dakota and received separate 

cooperative agreement awards for each. Serving both states proved to be 

difficult for the center, however, and most of its activity was focused in 

North Dakota. According to NIST officials, the state of South Dakota 

suggested to NIST the addition of a new South Dakota center. Through a 

competitive process, the new South Dakota center received an award 

equal in amount to the award that the North Dakota center previously 

received to serve South Dakota. The North Dakota center received an 

award equal in amount to the award it previously received to serve North 

Dakota.

NIST’s spending on cooperative agreement awards to MEP centers does 

not account for variations across centers’ service areas in terms of the 

demand for program services, which is a function of the number and 

characteristics of target manufacturing firms. As a result, NIST’s 

cooperative agreement award spending falls short of a component of 

beneficiary equity—a standard commonly used to design and evaluate 

funding formulas— that calls for funds to be distributed in a way that 

takes into account these variations so that each center can provide the 

same level of services to each target manufacturing firm, according to its 

needs. The original awards were made in part on the basis of each 

center’s identification of target manufacturing firms in its service area, 

including characteristics such as business size, industry types, product 

mix, and technology requirements, among other things. NIST’s funding 

opportunity announcements published in June 1995, May 1996, July 

2000, March 2001, and March 2003 specified that award amounts should 

be directly related to the level of activity of the center, which is a function 

NIST’s Cooperative 

Agreement Award 

Spending Does Not

Take into Account 

Variations in Demand

for Program Services or

in Centers’ Costs of 

Providing Services across 

Service Areas
Page 19 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

of the number of manufacturing firms in the designated service area. 

Because most of the current MEP center cooperative agreements were 

made on an incremental basis over a period of more than 15 years, they 

did not take into account the distribution of demand for program services 

across service areas. NIST officials told us they recognize that, as a 

result of the incremental addition of centers, wide variations emerged 

across centers in the relationship between their cooperative agreement 

award amounts and the number of target manufacturing firms in their 

service areas. Specifically, NIST officials told us that an analysis they 

recently conducted of current cooperative agreement award amounts per 

target manufacturing firm across service areas showed a mean of $333 

per target manufacturing firm and a range of $82 to $972, with 75 percent 

of centers falling between $179 and $487. As a result, centers may not be 

able to provide the same level of services to each target manufacturing 

firm, according to its needs.

NIST’s spending on cooperative agreement awards also does not take 

into account variations in MEP centers’ costs of providing services to 

target manufacturing firms. As a result, NIST’s cooperative agreement 

award spending falls short of another component of beneficiary equity. 

Under the beneficiary equity standard, funds should be distributed in a 

way that accounts for variations in the cost of providing services in each 

area, so that target manufacturing firms across MEP center service areas 

may receive the same level of assistance, according to their needs. The 

costs of operating the centers to provide assistance to manufacturing 

firms affect the amount of funding that centers have available for direct 

assistance to firms. According to NIST’s funding opportunity 

announcements, costs—as presented by the centers’ budgets—were 

considered in making the original awards, but these costs were presented 

on an incremental basis over a period of more than 15 years and, 

therefore, NIST’s consideration of these costs did not account for 

variations across service areas. By not accounting for these variations, 

NIST’s cooperative agreement award spending may further call into 

question centers’ ability to provide the same level of services to each 

target manufacturing firm, according to its needs.

NIST officials told us they are exploring ways to revise cooperative 

agreement award spending to take into account variations across service 

areas in the number of target manufacturing firms, among other factors. 

The officials discussed various options they are considering, but they did 

not identify an option they had agreed to implement or a timeline for 

decision making and implementation. They stated that one option they 

NIST Is Undertaking 

Efforts to Revise Its 

Cooperative Agreement 

Award Spending
Page 20 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

are considering is to provide increased awards to those centers that are 

currently underfunded relative to the mean relationship between centers’

cooperative agreement award amounts and the number of manufacturing 

firms in their service areas. They told us that doing so would result in a 

greater benefit in terms of manufacturing firms served than providing 

additional funds to centers that are overfunded relative to the mean. NIST 

estimates that if it were to increase cooperative agreement award 

amounts for the underfunded centers, the program would see up to a 20 

percent increase in the number of manufacturing firms served in these 

service areas over a 3-year period.

NIST officials told us that they face at least two impediments in revising 

cooperative agreement award spending. First, they stated that revising 

cooperative agreement award spending within the current level of funding 

would likely mean taking funds from some centers to give to others, and 

NIST is concerned about the effect this disruption might have on the 

impact of the program. The officials told us that they would like to 

increase NIST’s total cooperative agreement award spending and that 

they are exploring options to do so. They said they are examining their 

spending on direct support contracts to determine whether cost savings 

can be realized and redirected to cooperative agreement awards. They 

also said that they are considering making any changes over a multiyear 

period. Our prior work has shown that phasing in changes to funding 

levels gradually over a number of years minimizes disruptions to funding 

recipients by providing them time to adjust.20

The second impediment that the officials identified is the requirement in 

the MEP program’s authorizing legislation that federal cooperative 

agreement funds provided to MEP centers after their sixth year of 

operation not exceed one-third of their capital and annual operating and 

maintenance costs. This requirement leaves the centers responsible for 

raising the remaining two-thirds of matching funds from other sources. 

NIST officials told us that many centers already face difficulties raising the 

required two-thirds of matching funds and may not be able to raise the 

additional funds needed to access an increased cooperative agreement 

award.

 20See GAO-09-798.
Page 21 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

Manufacturing plays a key role in the U.S. economy, and NIST has 

established a nationwide system of MEP centers dedicated to supporting 

and strengthening the U.S. manufacturing base. However, because 

NIST’s cooperative agreement award spending does not take into 

account variations across service areas in the demand for program 

services—a function of the number and characteristics of target 

manufacturing firms—or variations in MEP centers’ costs of providing 

services, centers may not be able to provide the same level of services to 

each target manufacturing firm, according to its needs. NIST officials told 

us they are exploring ways to revise cooperative agreement award 

spending to take into account variations across service areas in the 

number of target manufacturing firms, among other factors. Revising 

NIST’s cooperative agreement award spending poses challenges 

because it could result in award decreases for some centers, along with 

increases for others. However, there are ways to ease the transition, such 

as phasing in changes gradually to minimize disruption to centers and the 

manufacturing firms they serve.

To ensure that NIST’s spending on cooperative agreement awards to 

MEP centers is more equitable to manufacturing firms in different service 

areas, we recommend that the Secretary of Commerce revise the 

program’s cooperative agreement award spending to account for 

variations across service areas in:

• the demand for program services—a function of the number and 

characteristics of target manufacturing firms—and

• MEP centers’ costs of providing services.

We provided a draft of this report to the Department of Commerce’s NIST 

for review and comment. In its written comments, reproduced in appendix 

II, NIST generally agreed with our findings and recommendation. In 

commenting on our recommendation, NIST stated that information in our 

report could help NIST continue to efficiently operate the MEP program.

NIST also provided technical comments, which we incorporated into the 

report as appropriate.

Conclusions

Recommendation for 

Executive Action

Agency Comments
Page 22 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

We are sending a copy of this report to the Secretary of Commerce, the 

appropriate congressional committees, and other interested parties. In 

addition, the report is available at no charge on the GAO website at 

http://www.gao.gov.

If you or your staff members have any questions about this report, please 

contact me at (202) 512-3841 or ruscof@gao.gov. Contact points for our 

Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on 

the last page of this report. GAO staff who made key contributions to this 

report are listed in appendix III.

Frank Rusco

Director, Natural Resources and Environment
Appendix I: List of Manufacturing Extension 

Partnership Centers, 2013

Page 23 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

State City Name

AK Anchorage Alaska Manufacturing Extension Partnership

AL

a

Birmingham Alabama Technology Network

AR Little Rock Arkansas Manufacturing Solutions

AZ Phoenix Arizona Commerce Authority

CA Torrance California Manufacturing Technology Consulting

CA San Ramon Corporation for Manufacturing Excellence

CO Denver Colorado Association for Manufacturing and Technology

CT Rocky Hill Connecticut State Technology Extension Program

DE Newark Delaware Manufacturing Extension Partnership

FL Celebration Florida Manufacturing Extension Partnership

GA

b

Atlanta Georgia Manufacturing Extension Partnership

HI Honolulu INNOVATE Hawaii

IA Ames Iowa Center for Industrial Research and Services

ID Boise Idaho TechHelp

IL Park Ridge Illinois Manufacturing Excellence Center-Chicago Region

IL Peoria Illinois Manufacturing Excellence Center-Downstate

IN Indianapolis Purdue Technical Assistance Program

KS Overland Park Mid-America Manufacturing Technology Center

KY Bowling Green Advantage Kentucky Alliance

LA Lafayette Manufacturing Extension Partnership of Louisiana

MA Worcester Massachusetts Manufacturing Extension Partnership

MD Columbia Maryland MEP

ME

c

Augusta Maine Manufacturing Extension Partnership

MI Plymouth Michigan Manufacturing Technology Center

MN Minneapolis Enterprise Minnesota

MO Rolla Missouri Enterprise

MS Ridgeland InnovateMEP Mississippi

MT Bozeman Montana Manufacturing Extension Center

NC Raleigh North Carolina Industrial Extension Service

ND Bismarck North Dakota Manufacturing Extension Partnership

NE Lincoln Nebraska Manufacturing Extension Partnership

NH Concord New Hampshire Manufacturing Extension Partnership

NJ Morris Plains New Jersey Manufacturing Extension Partnership

NM Albuquerque New Mexico Manufacturing Extension Partnership

NV Reno Nevada Industry Excellence

NY Albany Empire State Development’s Division of Science, Technology and Innovation (NYSTAR)

OH Columbus Ohio Manufacturing Extension Partnership

Appendix I: List of Manufacturing Extension 

Partnership Centers, 2013
Appendix I: List of Manufacturing Extension 

Partnership Centers, 2013

Page 24 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

State City Name

OK Tulsa Oklahoma Manufacturing Alliance

OR Portland Oregon Manufacturing Extension Partnership

PA Pittsburgh Catalyst Connection

PA Philadelphia Delaware Valley Industrial Resource Center

PA Williamsport Innovative Manufacturers’ Center

PA York MANTEC

PA Bethlehem Manufacturers Resource Center

PA Hanover Township Northeastern Pennsylvania Industrial Resource Center

PA Erie Northwest Pennsylvania Industrial Resource Center

PR Hato Rey Puerto Rico Manufacturing Extension

RI Providence Rhode Island Manufacturing Extension Services

SC

d

Columbia South Carolina Manufacturing Extension Partnership

SD Sioux Falls South Dakota Manufacturing and Technology Solutions

TN

e

Nashville University of Tennessee Center for Industrial Services

TX Austin Texas Manufacturing Assistance Center

UT Orem Utah Manufacturing Extension Partnership

VA Martinsville GENEDGE ALLIANCE

VT Randolph Center Vermont Manufacturing Extension Center

WA Mukilteo Impact Washington

WI Menomie Northwest Wisconsin Manufacturing Outreach Center

WI Madison Wisconsin Manufacturing Extension Partnership

WV Morgantown West Virginia Manufacturing Extension Partnership

WY Laramie Manufacturing-Works

Source: GAO analysis of National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) information.

a

According to NIST officials, the Alaska Manufacturing Extension Partnership closed in September 

2013.

b

According to NIST officials, the Florida Manufacturing Extension Partnership is expected to close by 

March 2014.

c

According to NIST officials, the Maryland MEP was established in July 2013.

d

According to NIST officials, Rhode Island Manufacturing Extension Services was established in 

February 2013.

e

According to NIST officials, South Dakota Manufacturing and Technology Solutions was established 

in January 2013.
Appendix II: Comments from the

Department of Commerce

Page 25 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

Appendix II: Comments from the

Department of Commerce
Appendix II: Comments from the

Department of Commerce

Page 26 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership
Appendix III: GAO Contact and Staff 

Acknowledgments

Page 27 GAO-14-317 Manufacturing Extension Partnership

Frank Rusco, (202) 512-3841 or ruscof@gao.gov

In addition to the individual named above, Susan Quinlan (Assistant 

Director), Greg Dybalski, Kim Frankena, Cindy Gilbert, Mark M. Glickman, 

Paul Kinney, Cynthia Norris, Marietta Mayfield Revesz, Emmy Rhine 

Paule, William B. Shear, Barbara Timmerman, and Jack Wang made key 

contributions to this report.

Appendix III: GAO Contact and Staff 

Acknowledgments

GAO Contact

Staff 

Acknowledgments

(361502)
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