IEN Radio Eric Sorensen

A German and Canadian national residing in China named Klaus Pflugbeil has pleaded guilty to stealing a U.S. electric vehicle company’s trade secrets and using them to build a China-based business. The Department of Justice release did not disclose the name of the American EV maker, but a New York Times article that reported Pflugbeil’s arrest in March named the mystery company as Tesla.Download and listen to the audio version below and click here to subscribe to the Today in Manufacturing po...

Ford has bet on electric vehicles to help drive future growth and like a lot of other automakers, it’s zeroed in on price point as one of the catalysts for driving consumer adoption.The automaker has seen some limited success so far with its F-150 Lightning and Mustang Mach-E. But those vehicles’ most basic packages start at about $40,000 and $50,000 respectively. Ford has seemingly understood for a while that a lower entry point will be necessary to get more drivers to switch from internal c...

NASA just scared the heck out of a lot of International Space Station (ISS) followers when it accidentally aired an emergency medical drill during a livestream.According to CNBC, the livestream on Wednesday evening was abruptly interrupted by a speaker announcing that an astronaut on board the ISS was suffering extreme compression sickness and may need to be placed inside a spacesuit filled with pure oxygen. The voice reportedly advised ISS crew members to check the astronaut’s pulse one more...

A group of Republican lawmakers has accused the Chinese company behind a proposed $2 billion electric vehicle battery plant in the Midwest of using forced labor — and urged the Biden administration to blacklist it from the country altogether.Rep. Darin LaHood, who represents a district spanning central and northern Illinois, said in a statement that an investigation by the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party found that Gotion’s supply chains and business relationships are en...

John Deere employs around 70,000 people worldwide, but the year 2024 has brought recurring announcements regarding workforce reductions – in fact, so many that keeping up can be a challenge.The latest cuts are in Moline, Illinois, where the company has informed workers in its Seeding and Cylinder operations that 120 employees would be placed on “indefinite layoff” effective June 28th. Download and listen to the audio version below and click here to subscribe to the Today in Manufacturing...

The supply of available homes is historically low. Land is expensive, material costs are high, and the market conditions have a particularly dramatic impact on smaller homes less than 1,800 square feet. However, modern manufacturing techniques have shown the potential to cut costs and build times significantly. While the world's largest 3D printer is quicklybuilding modest homes layer by layer in Maine, modern offsite manufacturing techniques are making it possible for "stick-built homes" to ...