The Department of Defense (DoD) has designated South Kansas as a Defense Manufacturing Community (DMC), making the region eligible for $5 million through the Office of Local Defense Community Cooperation’s Defense Manufacturing Community Support Program. The initiative is led by Wichita State University’s National Institute for Aviation Research (NIAR).

As one of 11 U.S. Defense Manufacturing Communities, South Kansas will strengthen the national security innovation base by expanding ultra-high and high-temperature material characterizations, capabilities, process tools, sustainment planning, technical workforce, and engineering competencies to enhance the defense industrial base capabilities and accelerated weapon system prototype development.

Defense Modernization Priorities: South Kansas will strengthen the national security innovation base by expanding ultra-high and high-temperature material characterizations, capabilities, process tools, sustainment planning, technical workforce, and engineering competencies for the purpose of enhancing the defense industrial base capabilities and accelerated weapon system prototype development.

National Defense Prototype Center

The South Kansas Defense Manufacturing Community (DMC) will create the National Defense Prototype Center that will link regional specialization and supply chain in support of the imperative to create a robust industrial base with:

stable sources of critical materials;
access to test facilities and broad availability to test results;
access to proprietary processes for critical small businesses;
robust engineering, technical, and trades workforce;
and resilient verified design tools and techniques.

Mission/Vision: The National Defense Prototype Center (NDPC) in Wichita, Kansas, in collaboration with the Department of Defense (DoD), defense industrial base, technical workforce, and academia, will extend the DoD's ability to research, design, test, prototype while addressing production factors, and field in meaningful numbers high-demand weapon systems that require high-temperature components and hypersonic capabilities that enable the manufacture, delivery, and sustainment of critical new platforms to U.S. service members and allies.

The NDPC provides secure space for development, prototyping, industrialization and testing of emerging high temperature materials and will encourage long-term community investments to strengthen national security innovation and expand the capabilities of the defense manufacturing industrial ecosystem.

National Defense Prototype Center Page

South Kansas DMCSP Activities

Wichita, the largest city in the state of Kansas, is the financial, transportation, health care, and distribution center of the South Kansas region. Other cities in the region include Hutchinson, Pittsburg, and Newton. The aerospace industry is the principle economic driver in the 27-county region, and manufacturing activities are concentrated in Wichita.

The South Kansas region is a mixed manufacturing ecosystem anchored in aerospace products. Due to the nature of aerospace’s complex and regulated manufacturing environment, the region’s manufacturers have highly complex design, automation, advanced materials, machinery, and fabrication supply chain capabilities.

Service Area: South Kansas (27 county region) with a defense manufacturing hub in the Wichita, Kansas Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA). South Kansas includes the following counties: Allen, Anderson, Bourbon, Butler, Chautauqua, Cherokee, Coffey, Cowley, Crawford, Elk, Franklin, Greenwood, Harper, Harvey, Kingman, Labette, Linn, Marion, McPherson, Miami, Montgomery, Neosho, Reno, Sedgwick, Sumner, Wilson, and Woodson.

About

WSU SI Logo

Wichita State University (WSU) Strategic Initaitives is committed to the primary goal of helping innovators close the gap between technical promise and successful implementation of new technologies and processes. With connections to testing laboratories across the university and relationships with industry professionals, Strategic Initiatives is an integral part in expanding the entrepreneurial ecosystem of Wichita and grown of the Innovation Campus at Wichita State University. For more information, visit the Strategic Initiatives website and on LinkedIn .

Wichita State University’s National Institute for Aviation Research provides research, testing, certification and training for aviation and manufacturing technologies. Established in 1985, NIAR has a +$190 million annual budget; 1,100 employees and nearly 1.6 million square feet of laboratory and office space in six locations across the city of Wichita, the Air Capital of the World. NIAR laboratories include Additive Manufacturing, Advanced Coatings, Advanced Manufacturing, Ballistics/Impact Dynamics, Composites/Advanced Materials, Crash Dynamics, Digital Twin, Engineering Design/Modification, Environmental/ Electromagnetic Test, Full-Scale Structural Test, Nondestructive Test, Reverse Engineering, Robotics/Automation, Virtual Engineering, eXtended Reality and the Walter H. Beech Wind Tunnel.

Wichita State University serves as the Kansas urban-based research university, enrolling more than 16,000 students from every state in the U.S. and more than 100 countries. Wichita State and WSU Tech are recognized for being student centered and innovation driven.

Located in the largest city in the state with one of the highest concentrations in the United States of jobs involving science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), Wichita State University provides uniquely distinctive and innovative pathways of applied learning, applied research and career opportunities for all of our students.

The Innovation Campus, which is a physical extension of the Wichita State University main campus, is one of the nation’s largest and fastest-growing research/innovation parks, encompassing over 120 acres and is home to a number of global companies and organizations.

For more information, follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/wichitastate and Facebook at www.facebook.com/wichita.state.

South Kansas Defense Manufacturing Community

National Defense Prototype Center

South Kansas DMCSP Activities

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