The Albuquerque Tribune
Optomec Inc. calls New Mexico's National Laboratories its Parents
4/10/00
Optomec Inc. may be the only company in existence that's a tech transfer from both national laboratories. Los Alamos National Laboratory mechanical engineer Thomas Swann started working with lasers in 1968, soon after they were first developed. He saw a need for making the parts that hold them together and in 1983 started Optomec Design Co. as a small optics shop, making rods and holders for lenses, mirrors, and lasers.
In 1997, two Sandia National Laboratories scientists, Doyle Miller and David Keicher, joined the company and brought with them some technology that may change the injection-molding and die-casting industries forever. Swann then became chairman of the board, and the company was restarted. "It was going in a different direction and need someone with management experience to take it over," Swann said.
That was Randall Kehl, who joined the company last year as president and CEO. Kehl, previously president and CEO of SafeZone Systems Inc., is charged with growing the company and possibly taking it public. Kehl is former chairman of the White House Working Group on Commercialization of Federal Laboratory Technologies during the Bush administration. He has an engineering degree from the Air Force Academy, an MBA and a law degree.
Miller and Keicher developed technology to turn simple powders into fully-functional, three dimensional models by using lasers to "weld" the powder together for form components, fix broken parts or overhaul existing parts. "The injection-mold tooling and die-casting industries will be able to do things they've never done before," Kehl said. Those Hot Wheels cars you played with as a kid are die-cast metal. Barbies are injection-molded plastic.
The new devices, call Directed Metal Deposition Systems, can create a rapid prototype of a device, a toy, a part or whatever, reducing the time a designer would need to make a model, form a mold and pour in the plastic or the metal. The prototype can even be used to make a final mold. "That's the macro side," Kehl said. "I fell like I've got two tigers by the tail."
On the micro side, the company can make direct-write electronics on almost any surface. One idea bouncing around the Optomec shop is putting an entire global positioning system on the back of a credit card. Antenna and all.
"We're a little bit different that your garden c=variety optical company in New Mexico," Kehl said. "We are making products for market, rather than going after DOE contracts."
For More Information Contact:
E. M. Optomechanical, Inc.
13170-B Central Ave, SE, #310
Tel: 505-281-1746
FAX: 505-281-1643
Internet:
sales@emopto.com