The Future of Manufacturing Is a "Lights Out" Factory

Sean Weisbrot: Bryan Debois is the director of industrial AI at Visy. A 300 plus million dollar annual revenue company that helps other companies with the operations and the automations and integrations and AI implementations in their manufacturing. And in this conversation we talked about manufacturing. And what the future of it looks like if there are certain countries that might be economic threats to one another. Different levels of manufacturing, like high value and low value items, how to find manufacturing partners or how to get started with your own manufacturing and much more. So if you like interviews where you learn something, then this is one for you. This is episode 213. Let's get to it. How is AI changing manufacturing?

Bryan Debois: Yeah, it's changing manufacturing in a lot of ways. Um, you know, one of the things that we are seeing now is that even well-established processes, processes that maybe, um, has been around, uh, for a hundred plus years, um, we are able now to apply AI to. Find those percentage improvements, um, that equate to millions of dollars. So pro, so industries as diverse as steel making, which again, has not changed in a long time. Aluminum making, um, glass making, these are well-established processes, well understood and well optimized equipment. Um, and yet we're able to introduce ai. To make those improvements. The other big area where AI is having an impact on manufacturing is in the fact that, uh, manufacturing right now is under, um, a lot of pressure, uh, from this huge labor shortage. So the last numbers I saw from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, um, was something like a half million person shortfall in the us um, in unfilled manufacturing jobs. So you've got folks who are not moving into that, those industries, um, you know, to start their career. And then on the opposite side of that scale, you've got lots and lots of really experienced folks, the folks who really knew how to keep that plant running, who during COVID and after, um, have left in huge numbers. So all of those, and they're generally boomers, all of the, uh, boomer generation have started to retire. And have taken all of that expertise with them. And so that combination, it, I mean it's, it's made it very challenging for us manufacturers and so AI is an opportunity to come in and, um, try to augment, capture that experience before those, those folks leave the company. Capture that, put it into the, the AI and we can talk a little bit more. It's called autonomous ai, that we're able to do that with, um, capture that experience and actually use that to help augment the capability of some of those, uh, newer employees.

Sean Weisbrot: On a scale of one to 10, how optimistic are you that this mission will succeed? Meaning it's that it's possible to. Fix the problem before these people retire and the knowledge goes with them.

Bryan Debois: Oh, uh, it, uh, I, I would say I, I mean, we have to, we've gotta figure out something, right? I, so I mean, I'm probably around a seven unfortunately. Um. It's, it's scary. Um, I, I think that it's gonna get worse before it gets better. I don't think that, you know, I live in this world of manufacturing and industrial and so. For me, I see it every day. I am in these plants all the time. Um, I think the, the general public is not quite aware of how bad the problem is right now. And, um, I think that it's gonna get worse before it gets better. I think, and I don't wish this, I don't want this to be the case, but I think that we're going to see, um, you know, maybe some kind of, um, major, um. Failures in, uh, equipment or, you know, um, maybe I, I, I hope not, but maybe, um, you know, plants having, you know, explosions or major issues that way. Um, or I think that we may find that we start to see, um, stuff slipping into food. Products and things like that. I think that I, I, you know, and I don't have any insight inside information on the Boeing situation, but it does feel like the Boeing situation is very much, um, a consequence of this too. Um, it's so it's gonna get worse before it gets better. I think AI is a huge step towards helping to solve that problem. I think that the other thing that we're seeing for better or for worse. Is it's prompting some of these companies that have 20 plus year old equipment, and that's typical for manufacturing. 20, 30-year-old equipment is very, very commonplace. I think that what we're seeing is, is, is they are starting to replace it with newer equipment so that at least you can get the parts for it. At least you've got a vendor that can maintain, help you maintain it. Um, instead of the kind of the patchwork duct taped. 30 5-year-old equipment that only one, you know, gentleman knew how to run, who's now gone. Um, and probably left abruptly. That was the other thing. It wasn't like the whole COVID thing. It wasn't when these folks left, it wasn't like it was kind of an orderly shutdown. They just kind of left. And um, you know, I've talked to clients who are like, yeah, bill used to run this piece of equipment. He's got stacks of papers on his. On his desk, but we don't really even have any clue. And, and it's not even like they've got a strategy. It's like they're just trying to survive. And the folks who are coming in are one and two year folks. They've got high turnover in these positions right now. Um, it is a generational thing. Um, so Gen Z, millennials, these are folks who really are not interested in spending the next 10 years of their life learning how to run this equipment or maintain this equipment in these factories. Um. You know, I talk to clients and it's like, well, we could wish that wasn't the case. You know, we could hope that that wasn't the case, but it is the case. So now it's time to just deal with that reality and figure out what we're going to do to keep these plants running, um, because, you know, they really are the lifeblood of, of an economy.

Sean Weisbrot: Let's think about the most ideal future for manufacturing in the United States. What does that look

Bryan Debois: like? So twofold. One is that we are gonna have to introduce more autonomy. Right. And so that means that the machines have to get smarter. We've gotta introduce more ai, um, if the equipment can start to run itself. I don't know. There's a term in our industry called a lights out factory. I don't know if you've heard that term, but the idea is, is that effectively, that's like the panacea. That's what kind of everyone is kind of working towards where effectively raw materials come in, goods go out the other side, and there's very little. Human interaction that needs to happen inside of that factory. It basically, when they say lights out, literally you could just turn the lights out and it'll just run. Um, we need to get closer to that, um, because we don't have the people who wanna do this. So, again, you could wish that wasn't the case, but that's just the reality. So we've gotta get to more autonomy. The second aspect of that though, um, that I think is gonna be important is that we've gotta move into higher value manufacturing. Um. For better or for worse, there's just not, there's just not going to be a lot of value in, um, American manufacturing making really inexpensive stuff. I mean, all of that is, is gonna go away. It's gonna go, um, to other countries. Uh, again, for better or for worse, you could wish it wasn't the case, but that's gonna be the case. And so. If we want to, as, as a country, which I think we do, um, stay in this manufacturing space and still be making stuff here, we need to move into higher value manufacturing.

Sean Weisbrot: I've heard from other people similar things, meaning as time goes on, less people will be doing work. And it seems like we'll have no choice but to offload that work to AI and in, in the, uh, case of manufacturing, obviously intelligent robotics. I understand why humans don't wanna do those jobs, and I understand that as. We're seeing the population numbers drop in a lot of countries because we're not replacement numbers anymore. It's, it's necessary, but I feel like there's something missing in all of us. I feel like there's something bad that we're, we're not seeing that's going to cause a big problem. And I guess some people might say it's, well, if you have this kind of lights out factory, well, oh, can't the AI teach the robot to make another intelligent robot? And then if, if these robots start making more of each other, then you know humans are all going to die. I. I, I know it's a, it's a long extrapolation, but I feel like there's something, if humans are missing from the loop, is it really going to make humanity better?

Bryan Debois: Right. So let's tease a couple things apart there. So I think the first thing is this idea that we're not gonna work. So, and I'm kind of a futurist, I'm an optimist generally speaking about the future. So even when I say, you know, I'm not. Super optimistic about the next, you know, maybe two to five years long term. I think the arc will be that this will be positive for humanity. So I'm generally optimistic about the future. So the first aspect is, is that humans aren't gonna work. I don't think that that's ever gonna be the case. I think that humans are kind of built to work. I think that we have kind of an, an inherent, um, motivation to work, to create, to make things. Um, and so. I think that what we'll find is that we're going to move into higher value tasks, and I think that we don't even really have to guess at that. If you look at the history. Even just the history of manufacturing, um, that's been the case. So, um, you know, as the industrial revolution happened and as we moved from manual labor and, you know, people are making things with their hands and stuff like that on the, on the plant floor, and we moved to automation, um, it's not like we suddenly didn't have jobs for people to do. They were moved into higher value tasks. The two examples I always like to give is, um, elevator operator. That was a real job. Someone's full-time job was to come into a building, a high rise building every day. And they operated that elevator and that was just their job. Um, and the other one is lamp lighter. That was a real job. So at night people would go around and they'd light lamps. No one's lamenting the loss of. Elevator operators or lamplighters, right? So those folks, you know, it wasn't like we've got, you know, still to this day we've got elevator operators that are sitting on the street and don't, I mean, those jobs, there's other jobs. So there will always be more jobs. There's always gonna be, we're gonna find new ways of innovating and new ways, um, for folks to add value in society. So I think we'll always be working that idea that we're gonna be. That there's gonna be AI robots around and we're just gonna sit back. I think that le leisure time will in increase. And I think we've also seen that, right? I mean, we take for granted the fact that, that we have a 40 hour work week, but that wasn't always the case, right? So and, and obviously there's pushes now to go move to maybe a 32 hour work week or something. And I'm certainly in favor of that. So I think our leisure time will increase, but I don't think we'll ever not work as a society now to address the other aspect of it. Will robots make other robots? Yeah. Like we want that to happen. I mean, robotics, like anything, we've gotta have somebody that makes it. And so we've gotta have factories that make more robots. Um, the, the more Skynet type of scenario where it's kind of self-replicating, where it starts to kind of think for itself. I. I don't see that happening in, I mean, I'm an AI expert. I live in this world every day. Um, while the, while these AI algorithms are very convincing and they're very capable and very certain scenarios, we're still so far from, uh, uh, a general ai, um, artificial general intelligence that I, I don't think it's any, I don't think it's a real concern that you need to worry about, uh, you know, on a day-to-day basis.

Sean Weisbrot: So the new CHATT four oh algorithm doesn't, no, not even a little.

Bryan Debois: I, um. Couple things there. So, uh, it doesn't take long to reach the limits of what even the new chat GPT can do if you, I have a subscription to it. I spend actually a decent amount of time, um, learning with it and, and kind of pressing the edges of it. And it doesn't take long for it to start to get confused. And, um, but so that's one aspect. But the other thing is, is I also understand the underlying algorithms. It doesn't actually understand anything. It doesn't, it doesn't know what it's saying. What it's really good at is picking what the next word, the next most, like word, likely word is based on this giant corpus of human speech that it's got, that it's been trained on. It just is really, really good at guessing the next word. That's it. It's, it's effectively, um, it's effectively just an auto-complete on steroids, um, and. That's great. And it's very, like I said, it's very convincing and I, I think it's really cool. And I think that there's a lot of great stuff that we can do with that capability. That's not a, that's not for nothing. I mean, that's not a small accomplishment, but it doesn't have any clue about human language. It really doesn't, it does not understand what those words mean. And, um, so it's, it's not any, I mean, we're not really any closer to, uh, a general intelligence with that. Um, and then deep reinforcement learning, which I think is the other major. Advancement that we've made in, you know, in the last 10 years around, uh, ai and that's the autonomous AI we talked about. That's based on deep reinforcement learning. I spend a lot of time in that 'cause that we actually use on the plant floor. And that's really interesting because it learns to build long-term strategy. It can make decisions and things like that. But it's still so narrow, like it's really capable, but only on the task that it's been trained on. Like if you even just put it on a different task within that same factory, it's not even gonna have any clue what. Mm-hmm.

Sean Weisbrot: Okay. So I want to move, I. Back towards, uh, manufacturing in, in general. Hmm. I, I know that you're based in the states. I know that you're American and it seems like, uh, you're, you're proud for a manufacturing to be happening in America. Uh, and there's nothing wrong with that. I have nothing against that. I, I agree. I think America should be taking some responsibility to bring manufacturing back. Uh. Again, only high value things like, uh, uh, space tech, you know, 3D printing tech, these kinds of high level. Um, do you think there's a threat from any other countries that could potentially become more dominant in manufacturing? Or if someone wanted to think about getting into manufacturing what country they might wanna look in, if not the us?

Bryan Debois: Yeah, so I mean, I, I think that, um. So I'm very bullish on manufacturing in general. I'm, I'm very bullish on kind of free trade between, between countries. Um, I. It's interesting when people, and not just you, I mean, you hear this a lot where people use terms like threat to describe manufacturing. It in my mind that it doesn't really always equate like a threat would be like a military threat or something like that. Um, I think that there is. And I think we saw this over COVID. I think that there's a very complex and intricate supply chain that exists in the world that most people don't understand. Um, we saw a, the average person kind of wake up to that a little bit during COVID when those supply chains were disrupted, but. I mean, you're gonna have countries that make lower value parts that you just need a billion of these parts. And, but that's gonna be an in input to a later process that maybe happens here in the States. And then we're doing, you know, maybe final assembly or we're doing more high value tasks associated with the, you know, um, you've got countries that are gonna make. Um, what are called commodity chemicals, so kind of the low value chemicals, the base level chemicals, ammonia, and things like that. Um, and then that's gonna be sent to a country that's gonna do the higher, you know, make higher value specialty chemicals out of those base level chemical. I mean, that's how this all works. So, you know, having a country that gets really good at making, you know, kind of low value products in bulk, in in volume, I mean, that's okay. Like that's kind of part of how this all works. And then. Some other country. All that does is create opportunity then in other countries to take those low, lower, you know, to take those input streams of products. And build something of, of higher value on top of it. When you look at the complexity of the things that we can build now versus even a hundred years ago, when you look at the complexity of like an A, a, uh, LCD, uh, uh, T or O-L-L-A-E-D-T-V or, and, and, um, you know, even just an, a automobile, um, you know, when you look at the complexity of the things that we can make now, um, it's a direct result of. Those supply chains. And so yes, that means that you're gonna have countries that are gonna make some of the inputs and you're gonna have other countries that are make other the inputs. And then you got other countries that'll take those inputs and put 'em together, um, into higher value outputs. So yeah, I, I never have quite looked at it that way. I, I think it's a much more intricate web. Um, and I think that, um. Not to get into politics, but I, I think that, um, a lot of times politics is what stands in the way of that supply chain operating. Um, when we do things like protective tariffs and things like that, I think that that more in, um, is I. Uh, an impedance to, um, that supply chain, that web working the, um, at its most optimal, let's put it that way. I think so, but we and, and we certainly. Okay. And, and that's really fair. And, and we would even use that word, if you've got two companies internally to that one company, you're gonna say that our competitor, competitor B is a threat to us. Right. You're gonna use that same terminology. And that's exactly what they mean, right. Is it's, they're an economic threat to us. But it also to me, has never seemed right that we're gonna somehow favor company A because company B can make it cheaper, better, faster, you know, and, and you know, so, okay, so then company A is gonna have to compete harder or they may have to ultimately pivot and start making different product or, I mean, okay. Like that to me is just how kind of the free market works. And so, yeah, I mean, I think that companies or uh, countries like companies have to compete. Um, they've gotta get better and eventually, I. They may have to move into making different things than, um, than what they made in the past. And I think that that's okay. I think that we're seeing that now in China, where as China gets that, that larger middle class, I think that we're already seeing that in real time. That um, even over there, you're gonna start to struggle to find people who wanna go and work in those plants. Um. Because, you know, they, they, they wanna do higher value tasks and I think that that's all okay. Um, and that's kind of that, um, you know, rising tide raises all ships kind of thing. I think that that's the positive impact that manufacturing has. I've always said that in my mind, manufacturing is the biggest lever that we can pull to increase the, um, prosperity of everyone in the world. When you have access to more, um, higher value, lower cost, um, higher quality products, that's prosperity. Now it's not gonna make you happy. That's a whole nother thing that's, you know, kind of psychology and philosophy and all that, but. From, you know, from the standpoint of people not starving from the people, from the standpoint of people not dying from preventable disease, from the standpoint of people having access to leisure and having access, I mean, that all is prosperity, um, for many measure. And, and I think that manufacturing is, is the biggest lever we can pull, uh, to get to that point.

Sean Weisbrot: So if someone came to you and they said, I want to start my own factory, or I wanna find a factory that I can work with, what would be the next thing that you say?

Bryan Debois: Yeah. So I don't know that someone would come to me to, to, uh, to ask that question. But, um, to, you know, I, the reality of it is, is that there are certain parts. It, it, you know, it, the first question is gonna be, are you, are you really looking to start a new factory in the US there's certain pockets of the country that are still pretty, um. Positive and, and supportive, I would say of, of starting a new factory. Um, but, uh, it's getting harder and harder to find. There's a lot of, not in my backyard kind of, um, attitudes, uh, sometimes in the United States where, yeah, you know, I don't really want a factory in my state. Um. So I think that that's gonna be part of the challenge is finding where you can do this. Um, and obviously, I mean, if someone's actually starting a factory, it's extremely capital, capital intensive. So they need a lot of money. Um, I. And, uh, so, you know, part of the challenge too, I think, again, without getting too political, is, is kind of reducing some of those hurdles to actually be able to even, you know, all the regulatory hurdles and everything that's in place, um, that stands in the way of an entrepreneur trying to start a new factory. Um, I think that that in a lot of ways also drives that offshore. Uh, it's like, you know what, why bother? Um, I've got a, a. Uh, a company right now that we're talking to and they're trying to start a brand new battery factory. And I mean, it's just, it's hard in the United States to try to get something like that off the ground. And the regulatory hurdles and the environmental, environmental hurdles. Um, and then you're competing with countries that kind of subsidize that kind of thing. So, you know. Hard to, you know, it's, there's a reason why a lot of those folks who, who maybe start with that idea end up just partnering with a manufacturer, you know, in, in, uh, more of the developing world or something like that.

Sean Weisbrot: So if someone wanted to find a factory to partner with, what are some things they should be thinking about? Well, I

Bryan Debois: think they need to be looking at, um. And as far as the actual like capital side of it, and there's people who specialize in that. So that's not my area of expertise. But in terms of the actual operation of the factory. I think there's a couple key things. One is, is that you need to be talking to a manufacturer who is looking at the future of manufacturing. So digital transformation is one of those big buzzwords right now in our world, and it's about applying digitalization to make a transformative effect on the day-to-day operations of that plant. You're gonna want to talk to a manufacturer who at least is looking at digital transformation. Ask 'em what their initiatives are, ask 'em what their AI strategy is. Obviously go take a tour of some of these facilities and make sure that, um, that all that lines up. So they should be a forward thinking company. They should be focused on continuous improvement. Some of the best companies, the clients that I've worked with, are clients that aren't just trying to keep things running, but they have allocated a portion of their budget every single year to continuous improvement. I worked with a great manufacturer. They basically have crowdsourced continuous improvement. So literally anyone in the organization can fill out a, uh, continuous improvement idea. Um, and, you know, there's, it's a stage gate, like there's multiple steps to get it to an actual executable project, but, um, they can submit an idea with here we, here's what I think the ROI, so, you know, some operator on the line who's just, you know, really motivated, can say, I think if we just did this, here's what the ROI would be. Here's what I think generally the cost would be, it goes to, you know, a panel and then they kind of approve it and so on and so forth. Um, and that's just part of their culture is, is a culture of continuous improvement. And I think that that's something that's really important. Um, so I think from a digitalization standpoint, I think the other aspect there. Is that you're going to want access to their data. So I work with life science manufacturers who, um, there's actually a lot of offshoring of life science, um, uh, of the actual drug making. And so they have what are called, um, contract manufacturers. And so those life science customers, um, in some cases it's a little shocking sometimes they don't have access to all the data coming from the plant floor. For the, that drug that's being manufactured. Um, I talked to one life science customer who, um, their actual contract manufacturers in Singapore and the data that they get, they get it once a month from that manufacturer and they get it in the form of PDFs. Um, actually I think they get physical papers maybe mailed to them and then they scan into PDFs. Anyway, it was a nightmare and I'm like, oh, that's kind of shocking. So, you know, having access to the, not shocking, having access to that realtime data. Um, and being able to monitor that. I mean, that's your manufacturing. Like, that's your lifeblood. If you're a company that's off, you know, that's kind of contracted that. So, um, making sure that you've got access to that I think is a big thing. I think the final point I would make, which is not necessarily around digitalization specifically, is just culturally is making sure that that company operates in a way that culturally aligns with, with your values and, um. Don't just choose on price. You know, make sure that, that that's a partnership that you're gonna wanna work with, uh, for a long time.

Sean Weisbrot: I'm not surprised that they got paper printed out and I'm, I'm more surprised you said Singapore and my first thought was Singapore does manufacturing. That doesn't seem a,

Bryan Debois: yeah, considering the fact that I think is, is this 10 miles wide or something? It's this tiny island in Asia, but um, it really has become, um. It's become the hub of kind of free market and um, uh, you know, free market economics in, in Asia. Um, and so there's actually a ton of manufacturing that happens on the island, which is crazy. I mean, they, they have to build up, not out because they don't have any land. So you'll have these large buildings where one floor they're making. Pharmaceutical ingredients. Um, the next couple floors might be a data center. The next couple, I mean, it is wild in Singapore, we have an office in Singapore, but, um, yeah, it's, it's, it's wild out there. But yeah, there's actually a, a decent amount of manufacturing that happens out there.

Sean Weisbrot: I've been to Singapore a number of times. Actually, the startup that I had before was, is registered in Singapore. Okay. And, uh, we've got a bank account in Singapore, and the banking is awful because it's just really outdated. For example, I wanted to update the, like, I think I wanted to update the password, and they're like, okay, you need to, you need to send us an email. Filling out a form requesting to change the password and we'll get you the password changed in a week. Mm-hmm. But I need to, I need to access my account now. We're sorry. That's just how it goes. Uh, I need to change my passport number. Like I, I've, I've gotten a new passport in the States. I need to update my passport number so I'm in compliance. Uh, yeah. No problem. Just get a notarized copy from the States. I'm not in the states. Well, you need to get a notarized copy from the states, and then you need to physically mail that to us. Along with a form that you filled out and signed physically, and then we'll update it in the next week or two. Guys, I'm not in the states. I can't get you a notarized copy, one and two. I don't have a printer. How am I supposed to print this document and sign it and then mail it to you? And then my, my lawyer in Singapore also needed this. Uh, so that the registration for the startup would be updated as well. So now I have to get two notarized copies and two physical pieces of paper signed and mailed to two separate people, and it's gonna cost like several hundred dollars to get it all done. And, and mailed and just, uh, Singapore is a bit backwards for me in that regard. Love the country, but like the, the bureaucracy is worse than Europe, and Europe is already like annoying for bureaucracy for me.

Bryan Debois: But I mean, the question would be why did you put your headquarters in s of all of Asia, you know, big continent. Why did you put your headquarters in Singapore?

Sean Weisbrot: The reason I originally did it was because we started off as a blockchain based company, and at the time, Singapore was very favorable for blockchain companies. They had the simplest framework for legal, you know, management. And so, and for raising funds, it was the most trusted in all of Asia, of all the countries, right?

Bryan Debois: And so those are the ty types of reasons. And so. I don't know as probably as much about blockchain as you do, but the favorable laws across a lot of industries is, and like you said, the uh, um, you know, kind of the trustworthiness. Those are two big reasons why a lot of companies are, are putting that, um. You know, that footprint on this tiny little island. So same reason, even despite all the paperwork. I mean, we had to go through all that too when we opened our office out there. But, um, it still, yeah, I mean, it, it's, it's always like, compared to what, well compared to the rest of Asia, this is still kind of the, uh, the best place to put that, uh, to put your, your foot down. And then from there we do have other offers. In Asia, but we, um, our

Sean Weisbrot: head, yeah, it makes sense. We, we eventually got rid of the blockchain, but we didn't get rid of Singapore because we were already established there. We already had investors and it would've been a headache to just change, so we kept doing it. Um, but, but yeah, every year I deal with the compliance and it's, it's frustrating and, and expensive. So. So would you say Singapore is an interesting place to look for partners for manufacturing or. A hundred

Bryan Debois: percent. I, I think you start there. Um, and then like I said, I mean, even us we started opening offices in other, um, countries in Asia. But um, yeah, I think that you start there and, and that's your springboard into the Asia market would be Singapore. That would be my, I. My suggestion, I'm not, like I said, I'm not an expert in that, but I mean, that's certainly the path that we took and I think I see a lot of other countries, uh, companies doing that.

Sean Weisbrot: Okay. So I know like for China, there's Alibaba Ali Express, which a lot of people use in the, the smaller e-commerce kind of side of manufacturing. Is there some sort of platform like this where it you can go to find global partners for manufacturing?

Bryan Debois: Yeah, that was, that's, like I said before, I, I'm not an expert in that, so I'm not a hundred percent sure how you would go about and connecting with, uh, with those folks. So that's just not my area of expertise.

Sean Weisbrot: Okay. Fair enough. So you've, you know that you wanna find someone to work with, you have a baseline idea that. They're gonna have a good cultural fit. They're gonna be forward thinking. Is there anything that you should be thinking about in terms of how to work with them that might be to protect yourself from them screwing you over? This is very common in China. I don't know about other countries, but, but do you know anything about the, the legal aspects of partnering with these companies or some, you know.

Bryan Debois: Yeah. Again, so my area of expertise is more, once you know that company is actually making product, that's typically where we get en engaged is at that level. So, uh, not an expert in the legal, um, aspect of it. I absolutely, I'm still hearing though, from companies, uh, that are my clients that work with. Uh, that partner with, uh, Chinese manufacturing, um, that, that is the intellectual property thing is still a major issue. Um, it's still a big concern, um, where, you know, you hire a, a Chinese contract manufacturer and they're making your product, uh, one month and then a couple months later the. Factory down the road is making your same product, um, but with a different name on it and for cheaper and yeah, it's, it's a serious issue that, um, that I know many of my, uh, clients deal with

Sean Weisbrot: and they're putting it on Amazon with these, with these brand names that are nonsensical letters put, put together. And they're all in caps. Yeah, yeah,

Bryan Debois: yeah. So not, I, you know, I don't have any good answers yet for how, you know, how that can be, um. How that can be solved. Um, but yeah, definitely the intellectual property thing is, is a concern.

Sean Weisbrot: Is there anything that you feel you can talk about in this regard that might be helpful to people that are more in the earlier stages that I am not asking?

Bryan Debois: Yeah, I think that, um, uh. Y you know, like I said, finding a, a, a capable partner who knows how to kind of navigate you through, um, you know, this whole maze. If, if you're just coming into this for the first time. Um, it's, uh, you know, there's, there's one of the things that we talk about in manufacturing is scale up. Um, so even if you've got something, and you'll see this on Shark Tank and things like that, you know where even if you've got a really good idea. Um, that maybe even works in kind of small scale. Um, there, there can sometimes be a big challenge in terms of scale up. And so, um, understanding that and finding a good partner to work with, um, that can help navigate that. I'd say generally speaking too, um, I. This goes for any company. Um, you've gotta be nimble. You've gotta be agile, you've gotta be ready to pivot. Um, you can't just throw all your eggs in one basket. You can't just, um, have one idea and think that that's, that's gonna be enough. So, um, I had a, um, a client that, uh, makes aluminum and they've been making aluminum for, again, probably over a hundred years. Long, long old company. And this was now, this was the mid two thousands. And around that time, an interesting thing happened in the United States. We started to open up our electrical grids, um, deregulate them, and we started to create these open markets for electricity. And anyone I. If you had generation capability, you were allowed to provide energy to the grid. Okay, so, so we helped this old, old aluminum manufacturing. Oh, and by the way, I don't know how much you know about the production of aluminum, but it takes huge amounts of electricity, so. Every aluminum manufacturer in, in the world either consumes a huge amount of electricity or, um, has their own power generation capability. Well, this is one of, um, you know, this old aluminum company that had lots of sites and many of these sites had power generation capability, so we helped them hook up to this market. It's an electronic market, and so the market will send a signal and say, Hey, we need power right now. Everyone just turned on their acs. We need tons of power right now. And so. Because of that, we're gonna pay a premium for that. And so this aluminum company, you know, traditional, long, long aluminum company would actually, it turns out too, that one of the advantages that the aluminum production process has is that they can actually, um, they can pause the process without it having a huge impact for a certain amount of time. They can pause the process without having a huge impact on the final product. And so they would actually, when that signal came, that, that the grid's paying. A premium for electricity, they would actually stop making aluminum for hours, um, you know, maybe even days and start providing electricity to the grid. And the CEO, and I love this line, the CEO in a, in a public forum was asked after they started doing this, and they were making money hand over fist, um, selling electricity to the grid. And this, and the CEO was asked in this public forum, um, you know, aren't you an aluminum company? Why aren't you making aluminum? And he said. Yeah, we've always made aluminum, but we're not in the business of making aluminum. We're in the business of making money. And this is what's making us money right now. And so I love that idea. Like, like that to me is what entrepreneurial, uh, the entrepreneurial spirit's about, is being able to pivot and find those avenues, um, you know, to, to make revenue. Uh, even when your original idea, you know, what tides are gonna change, the world's gonna change. And so being able to adapt to that, um, the epilogue of that, by the way, this was the mid two thousands. It was like a gold rush around that. If anyone's out there listening, um. Lots of companies do this now. Uh, it's, uh, the, the market is flooded, so you're not gonna make, uh, the gold rush is over. Um, uh, but you know, one of the things that we absolutely, now it's kind of become commonplace. Um, I. To actually shed electricity to the grid. Um, and so one of the things we advise, I mean, we work with college campuses that have a generation capability. Uh, we work with hospitals that have generation capability. Any, any company that can generate electricity. Um, we talk to them about, are you, do you have a program where you're selling that electricity back to the grid? And many companies do. So that's why I said it's, it's pretty crowded market now. But that to me is that idea of, of pivoting and, and, um, being agile in your approach.

Sean Weisbrot: What's the most important thing you've learned in working with manufacturing, if not that?

Bryan Debois: Um, the most important thing I've learned in manufacturing is that, um, it, it really is about the people. And this, I mean, it kind of comes back to what I said at the beginning, like a company is people, a company is made up of people. It's, it's not really the assets. And we're seeing that now more than ever, that these companies that thought that, well, I've got, I've got. You know, billions of dollars of equipment and assets around the world. That's my company. You know, I can make, I can make product with that. Well, it turns out that unless you have the right people who know how to operate that equipment, who know how to maintain that equipment, um, who know how to squeeze the most performance out of that equipment, you really had nothing. You, you just had a bunch of equipment. And so it really is about the people. And so, um, it goes back to kind of the, the block and tackle of building, um, building teams, hiring the right people and filling your company with folks who are forward thinking that are focused on continuous improvement. Um, focusing on culture, um, and. Those are the things that apply whether or not you're a five person startup or, you know, a 50,000, uh, person, global manufacturer. Um, it really comes down to people. Um, so yes, even in the world of manufacturing that, you know, from the outside looking in looks like it's factories and equipment and assets and all of that's important. Yes. But still the most important thing of the people.