Johnny Ash is the Michael Phelps of injection molding. Or maybe the Joey Chestnut. Whatever analogy works best for describing the top plastics technician in the world.
Throw a tough molding challenge at Ash, and he'll fix it in a jiffy. Usually faster than anyone else in the world.
We know that thanks to the SimTech Challenge, a contest that Paulson Training Program Inc. first introduced two years ago at NPE2018. Ash won the contest's top prize in 2019, and he's still a regular on top of the leaderboard.
Paulson Training is a family-owned company that makes interactive plastics training courses, offers e-learning programs and conducts seminars. It came up with the contest to help spread the word about its SimTech injection molding machine simulator.
In the process, the company ended up tapping into the competitive side of thousands of plastic technicians.