The MEP-Assisted Technology and Technical Resource (MATTR) program offers clients of MEP Centers, small and mid-sized manufacturers (SMMs), direct access to wide-ranging, world-class technical expertise available at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) research labs and user facilities. A partner to the U.S. manufacturing sector for more than a century, NIST has a proven track record of collaboration with existing manufacturers and aspiring start-ups.

MATTR has been piloting operations since 2016, successfully connecting NIST Lab technical experts with MEP client manufacturing companies around the U.S. on numerous occasions to provide meaningful technical assistance. Currently MATTR operates in an informal mode, in which NIST staff share technical expertise relating to manufacturer issues, essentially as a professional courtesy that MATTR facilitates. No funding is exchanged in the current mode of MATTR operation.

NIST MEP, in the process of expanding MATTR to include more extensive engagements among NIST Lab staff and MEP Center clients, is exploring the boundaries and constraints associated with this planned MATTR expansion. Funding will be available later in 2019 to NIST Lab staff for such engagements. These engagements may include NIST staff consultation with companies, along with the conduct of NIST services such as special measurements, special tests, and NIST user facility access. MATTR engagements, likely involving Cooperative Research and Development Agreements (CRADAs) between MEP Centers, their clients, NIST, and NIST MEP, may be funded (up to $50,000) by NIST MEP.

Though not every technical problem submitted through MEP Centers by small or midsized manufacturers has a solution at NIST, the MATTR program staff make every effort to find NIST Lab expertise appropriate to the submission.