Make It: Frank Conversations on the Future of Manufacturing
Oct 13, 2026 · 21 min · 12 segments
A $40,000 robot can transform a small manufacturer. It can also end up gathering dust. New technology is cheaper and more accessible than ever, but picking the wrong tool can be a costly mistake…
Ethan KarpHostMargaret CashmereHostSo, Ethan, if manufacturing has been transforming forever, as Felix intimated, what's different about this moment we find ourselves in?
What's different now is the speed and convergence of these technologies and the cost.
But right now, and you can see it in the public sphere around AI and how quickly that advances on a month-to-month basis.
And since they are cheaper, you don't have to bet the whole farm on a new technology.
The other thing that's different is these technologies are slightly different than just getting the next upgrade of your machine.
Yes, those exist too, but there are new ways to put different types of robots, AI as a whole concept.
Those are changing the way companies are thinking about working, and that makes this time different.
Imagine you're a small manufacturer, the kind that make up our industry for the most part, 99% of the industry in Ohio and in the U.S., You're a small company.
Isn't that what's holding a lot of manufacturers back from jumping into advanced technology?
While we've always had technology and you've always had to invest, that is the history of manufacturing.
The speed and the different ways of working right now are creating a bottleneck in terms of small company ability to adapt them.
So, Ethan, if manufacturing has been transforming forever, as Felix intimated, what's different about this moment we find ourselves in?
What's different now is the speed and convergence of these technologies and the cost.
But right now, and you can see it in the public sphere around AI and how quickly that advances on a month-to-month basis.
And since they are cheaper, you don't have to bet the whole farm on a new technology.
The other thing that's different is these technologies are slightly different than just getting the next upgrade of your machine.
Yes, those exist too, but there are new ways to put different types of robots, AI as a whole concept.
Those are changing the way companies are thinking about working, and that makes this time different.
Imagine you're a small manufacturer, the kind that make up our industry for the most part, 99% of the industry in Ohio and in the U.S., You're a small company.
Isn't that what's holding a lot of manufacturers back from jumping into advanced technology?
While we've always had technology and you've always had to invest, that is the history of manufacturing.
The speed and the different ways of working right now are creating a bottleneck in terms of small company ability to adapt them.
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