NEW CASTLE, Del. – Senator Coons journeyed from the Senate floor to the factory floor Thursday to visit with local manufacturers at New Castle’s WhiteOptics, LLC. The award-winning startup develops and manufactures state-of-the-art materials used to improve the lighting quality and energy efficiency of LED and fluorescent lighting products. Nicole Steele from the Alliance to Save Energy, where Chris is a Congressional Vice Chair, also joined the tour.
WhiteOptics’ innovative materials, developed and assembled at their Quigley Boulevard facility, are used by some of the nation’s leading LED manufacturers, including GE and Cree. During the visit, Chris had the opportunity to meet with employees and try his hand at some of the manufacturing work performed at the facility –from sheering metal to slitting and packaging film.
“In a few short years, WhiteOptics has developed a cutting edge, highly efficient lighting product here in Delaware that’s being sold across the United States and to markets around the world,” Chris said. “Meeting with the team behind this innovative startup is a reminder of just how inventive, creative, determined, and capable American manufacturers are.”
Eric Teather, WhiteOptics’ founder and CEO, joined Chris and Nicole at the facility, and discussed some of the challenges his startup faces as it seeks to grow and create new jobs in Delaware. As an innovative, early-stage company, intellectual property protection – including protection of the trade secrets the company uses to manufacture its products – is a chief concern for WhiteOptics.
Trade secrets are often referred to as the “secret sauce” that makes companies work. In April, Senator Coons introduced the bipartisan Defend Trade Secrets Act to empower companies to protect their trade secrets in federal court. The bill creates a federal private right-of-action, to give trade secrets the same legal protections that other forms of critical intellectual property already enjoy. The legislation has been endorsed by a broad range of small and large manufacturers.
“For a small startup business, being able to act on your own, through your own attorney, promptly, is going to make a lifesaving difference,” Chris said. “When the NSA, and the FBI, and the Department of Justice are saying that American manufacturers are the subject of intentional, directed cyber-hacking designed to steal trade secrets every day, we ought to be doing more to strengthen the legal protections available to them.”