Ben Franklin board approves $150,000 in new investments

The Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Northeastern Pennsylvania’s board of directors recently approved $150,000 to be distributed to five companies in loans with warrants.

Each company will receive between $10,000 and $50,000.

Ben Franklin provides matching funding to companies that work with a college or university partner.

Molcube in Bethlehem was awarded $50,000 to develop and configure a set of software tools for molecular modeling and simulations of complex biological and nanomaterial systems.

Martz Technologies in Berwick was awarded $40,000 to optimize energy usage and manpower and extend equipment life for municipal water and wastewater entities using artificial intelligence models and advanced data analytics.

Polytek Development Corp. in Easton was awarded $25,000 to determine requirements for a new Enterprise Resource Planning system and identify a vendor and software package to meet company needs.

The university partner of Martz and Polytek is Lehigh University’s Enterprise Systems Center.

Production Systems Automation in Duryea was awarded $25,000 to provide facility planning and layout optimization for a plant expansion.

American Paper Bag in Sugar Notch was awarded $10,000 to review facility options and recommendations for continued growth at this manufacturer of innovative paper bags.

The university partner of Production Systems Automation and American Paper Bag is
Wilkes University.