InteliCoat awarded $150K grant from New England Trade Adjustment Assistance Center to fund business-building consulting projects

SOUTH HADLEY, MA , Aug. 25, 2011 (Press Release) - InteliCoat Technologies, a world leader in the manufacture of coated paper, film, and specialty substrates for digital imaging applications, today announced it has been awarded a $150,000 Financial Assistance Grant from the New England Trade Adjustment Assistance Center (NETAAC). As a government funded non-profit organization, NETAAC offers cost-shared assistance to import-impacted manufacturers through a grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce under the Trade Adjustment Assistance for FIRMS program. The grant is aimed at funding business-building consulting projects. InteliCoat will aggressively use the $150,000 grant to dramatically streamline its sales, manufacturing and operational processes and procedures to foster continued production improvements and growth.

"NETAAC strives to provide timely, cost effective and material business services to manufacturing clients throughout New England, and we are extremely thrilled to work with InteliCoat," said Lisa McHatton, director at NETAAC. "The company's exciting product offerings combined with its commitment to building and improving its world-class Lean Manufacturing program, make us confident that InteliCoat will continue to advance its role as a player in the competitive global marketplace."

Building off of InteliCoat's successful Lean Manufacturing Program, which was originally launched in October 2007, InteliCoat strives to use the NETAAC grant to streamline its sales, manufacturing and operational processes. As part of the plan, InteliCoat will tie its business system into its salesforce.com implementation to deliver real-time information about the state of orders to the field. Additional manufacturing and operational improvements will be made, including a major initiative to improve coating machine speeds. This will enable InteliCoat to combat material price increases with savings from machine efficiencies.

"I am proud to advocate on behalf of domestic small businesses like InteliCoat Technologies. My work to retain and support domestic companies is well known and InteliCoat epitomizes the type of business model needed to prosper in our global economy," said Congressman Richard Neal, representative for the Second District of Massachusetts. "While businesses all over the world compete for clients and services, I am confident InteliCoat will continue to grow with its cutting edge marketing and production."

NETAAC's goal is to help New England manufacturers increase profitability and retain employees while competing against imported products. It is NETAAC's philosophy that the only true protection for U.S. workers and industries versus foreign competition is for domestic manufacturers to be profitable, with manufacturing process technology and labor productivity that is equal to or better than World Class standards. NETAAC is committed to assisting manufacturers achieve this goal.

"This is a true vote of confidence in our business plan by the U.S. Department of Commercebacked NETAAC, which has repeatedly helped clients obtain an average 45% growth in productivity within two years of completing the program," said Joe Lupone, President and CEO of InteliCoat. "We look forward to working with the organization to increase profitability and productivity, as well as enhance our manufacturing processes and capabilities to compete in the competitive global economy."

About InteliCoat Technologies
As a world leader in the manufacture of coated paper, film, and specialty substrates for digital imaging applications, InteliCoat Technologies® has earned a reputation for producing innovative products for the wide format printing market, including the award-winning Magic® brand portfolio of digital imaging media, the Magiclée® brand of digital fine art and specialty media, Museo® brand digital fine art media and the JetSet® brand of products for the CAD market. InteliCoat is dedicated to conducting its business with maximum sensitivity to environmental compliance and concern as part of the company.s commitment to continually improving its environmental performance at all levels. InteliCoat operates two manufacturing facilities in the United States, with sales and marketing operations in Australia, The Netherlands, North and South America. Worldwide headquarters is in South Hadley, Massachusetts, USA. InteliCoat is a Sun Capital Partners company.