Pentagon playing key role in reshaping U.S. industrial future.

• Position: From the National Defense Blog

The revival of U.S. manufacturing was a dominant theme of the 2016 presidential election. As the jobs rhetoric has grown louder, federal agencies led by the Defense Department have been quietly laying the foundation for a high-tech manufacturing surge.

The Pentagon, notably, has been assembling a large network of government, private-sector and academic players in a bid to secure access to critical technologies the military needs, while also trying to motivate corporations to invest in advanced manufacturing research.

The Defense Department awarded a contract to American Robotics Inc., based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to manage the "Advanced Robotics Manufacturing," or ARM Institute, the eighth DoD-led hub that becomes the 14th member of the "Manufacturing USA" network.

Defense officials and industry analysts have hailed this business model because it spreads the financial burdens across many players and puts both the government and the private sector in a position to win big, if projects end up developing successful products that can be commercialized.

American Robotics--a consortium of state and local governments, industry, universities, community colleges and non-profit organizations from across the country--contributed $173 million to the ARM Institute. That will be combined with $80 million in federal funding.

The Pentagon...