INNOTEC AUTOMATION (SHANGHAI) CO., LTD

Innotec, which makes lighting, applied metals and power-distribution products for the automotive, office-furniture and retail-lighting markets, uses a flat, decentralized organizational structure that gives each of its manufacturing lines, called “cells,” control over its own P&L and balance sheet. Those cells then report their operational and financial results to the rest of the company every month. Owned in part by an employee stock-option plan, Innotec has more than 20 U.S. patents and manufactures products in the U.S., China, Europe and Mexico. The employees take a similar approach to giving back. For instance, the company helped launch a charter school in Zeeland called Innocademy, where teachers, rather than administrators, run the schools. Innotec also helped fund and organize a well-drilling project in Nigeria that is providing clean water to more than 140,000 people."