2017 Manufacturing Leadership Awards Program Honors Trailblazers of Industry Transformation

Industry 4.0 Pioneer Dr. Detlef Zühlke, Leo Reddy and The Dow Chemical Company receive top honors

SANTA CLARA, Calif., June 15, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Last night at the 13^th Annual Manufacturing Leadership (ML) Awards Gala, produced by Frost & Sullivan's Manufacturing Leadership Council, top honors were presented to Industry 4.0 founding father Dr. Detlef Zühlke who was named Manufacturing Leader of the Year. The Dow Chemical Company took home the Manufacturer of the Year, Large Enterprise Award.

Winners of the 2017 ML Awards gathered at the Hyatt Regency Huntington Beach Resort and Spa where they were recognized for their outstanding achievements. The program's distinguished panel of expert judges selected Dr. Zühlke as the Manufacturing Leader of the Year from among the other 91 winners. Dr. Zühlke was honored for his founding and ongoing leadership of the SmartFactory initiative, which, in cooperation with the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence, has become known as the birthplace of the Industry 4.0 paradigm of intelligent, modular and digitized production.

The Dow Chemical Company was selected as Manufacturer of the Year in the Large Enterprise category. Dow, now a two-time winner of the Manufacturer of the Year Award, was recognized for three outstanding initiatives that, together, represent a transformation tour de force. They included a massive, $4 billion new Gulf Coast plant that has become the largest propylene plant in the U.S., deployment of an ambitious operational improvement system that saved hundreds of millions of dollars, and a unique talent management initiative that helped to engage and inspire Dow's workforce.

Manufacturer of the Year, Small/Medium Enterprise was non-other than nanotechnology start-up Pixelligent Technologies. Pixelligent's breakthrough PixClear nanocrystals technology and PixClearProcess manufacturing platform promise to transform the already rapidly expanding market for LED lighting and displays and the devices that use them.

"The ML Awards' top winners in 2017 are shining examples of the current era of digital transformation now coursing through the manufacturing industry," said David R. Brousell, Co-Founder of Frost & Sullivan's Manufacturing Leadership Council. "I congratulate these manufacturers and the leadership teams that made their achievements possible."