SME Names Outstanding Young Manufacturing Engineers

SME, the professional association committed to advancing manufacturing and developing a skilled workforce, has announced its lineup of 2021 Geoffrey Boothroyd Outstanding Young Manufacturing Engineers. The 14 awardees were selected based on their diverse manufacturing backgrounds, technology advancements/improvements and state-of-the-art research.

The 2021 award namesake, University of Massachusetts Professor Geoffrey Boothroyd, Ph.D., FSME, and president of Boothroyd Dewhurst Inc., was selected for his early-career development of the widely used design for manufacture and assembly (DFMA) methodology.

“Each of the young engineers from the U.S., Canada and Sweden have demonstrated their ability to design, develop and execute new, impactful technologies within each of their respective areas of interest, academic institutions, research labs and across a variety of industries,” says Robert Willig, SME executive director and CEO. “We're looking forward to watching their careers continue to unfold and transform manufacturing as their role model and award namesake, Dr. Boothroyd, once did.”

While membership in SME is not required for this recognition, each of the 2021 SME Geoffrey Boothroyd Outstanding Young Manufacturing Engineers are part of the SME community, having been members prior to their selection:

• Michael P. Brundage, Ph.D., National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD;
• Elizabeth Bullard, Ford Motor Co., Royal Oak, MI;
• Andrew Honeycutt, Ph.D., Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Knoxville, TN; 
• Nick Horvath, Ph.D., Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Powell, TN;
• Ethan Hughey, Ford Motor Co., Royal Oak, MI;
• Saurabh Kajaria, Vault Pressure Control, Houston, TX;
• Arkadeep Kumar, Ph.D., Applied Materials Inc., Santa Clara, CA;
• Tsz-Ho Kwok, Ph.D., Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada;
• Chao Ma, Ph.D., Texas A&M University, College Station, TX;
• Austin Mann, Boeing Research & Technology, St. Louis, MO;
• Miguel Saez, Ph.D., General Motors Research & Development, Warren, MI;
• Dinakar Sagapuram, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX;
• Sourabh K. Saha, Ph.D., P.E., Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA;
• Xi “Vincent” Wang, Ph.D., KTH Sweden, Stockholm, Sweden.

SME has highlighted the accomplishments of over 450 young manufacturing engineers—and the overall impact their work has made in manufacturing—for over four decades through this award. It is currently seeking nominations for the 2022 Outstanding Young Manufacturing Engineers Award by Aug. 1, 2021, at sme.org/oyme.  

Sources: Press materials received from the company and additional information gleaned from the company’s website.