Sarah Fisher

Manager of Marketing and Communications

coghlin companies sbane innovation awards

Coghlin Companies’ Ryan Mannion (left) and Bill Laursen (right) participate in the Smaller Business Association of New England’s Innovation Awards at the Westin Hotel in Waltham.

The annual Smaller Business Association of New England (SBANE) Innovation awards were held last night at the Westin Hotel in Waltham, and members of the Coghlin Companies business development team proudly supported an impressive group of local innovators, including several of their customers. The SBANE Innovation Awards recognizes “companies that have transformed their innovative ideas into a product or service that delivers proven value to customers”. The awards ceremony is the final event in a three part competition process where winners are celebrated for their contribution to the smaller business community.

The program began with a virtual welcome from Congresswoman Niki Tsongas, who spoke about the importance of investing in and utilizing our small business community to help cultivate and support innovation. She discussed the long standing history of collaboration between local companies and university’s in developing new technologies and encouraged attendees to get involved and continue exploring this strategic path that has had great success historically.

The keynote speaker, Michael Shaughnessy, Vice President of Integrated Supply Chain for Raytheon Integrated Defense Systems, discussed how Raytheon is shifting their corporate culture to create a broader collaboration opportunity with their suppliers and prospective suppliers so that a higher level of innovation and service can be offered to their customers. They are hoping to work with more small businesses in New England in a more creative and transparent way to help find the best solutions possible. Shaughnessy encouraged the attendees to explore similar collaborative tactics in their companies, a theme that Coghlin Companies has seen become much more prevalent this year, most recently at the Worcester Business Journal Manufacturing Summit.

Bill Laursen, Senior Vice President of Sales and Strategy stated, “The evening provided a tremendous opportunity to network with industry peers and business innovators of all sizes as well as meet the next generation of up and coming entrepreneurs”. As the Coghlin Companies mission is to help technology innovators become global leaders, we are honored that five of the award winners in 2015 are current customers at Columbia Tech and Cogmedix for product development, contract manufacturing, and medical device contract manufacturing. We look forward to the possibilities of working with some of the 2016 award winners and continuing to support the great work done by SBANE for the smaller business community.