Augmented Ops

Manufacturing is often discussed in terms of technology, productivity, and investment — but rarely in terms of people as infrastructure. In this episode of Augmented Ops, Stacey Weismiller, Founder of the American Manufacturing Futures Institute, joins Natan Linder to reframe the conversation.

Stacey draws on her background spanning manufacturing, economic development, and global policy to explore why people, access, and community must sit at the center of industrial renewal. Together, they discuss workforce participation, civic manufacturing, equitable growth, and how AI can augment human work without eroding trust or dignity.

The conversation spans everything from factory jobs and childcare to resilience, reindustrialization, and why manufacturing needs a new narrative — one that values stewardship as much as efficiency.

Watch the full episode on YouTube.

Augmented Ops is a podcast for industrial leaders, citizen developers, shop floor operators, and anyone who cares about what the future of frontline operations will look like across industries. This show is presented by Tulip, the Frontline Operations Platform. You can find more from us at Tulip.co/podcast or by following the show on LinkedIn.

Special Guest: Stacey Weismiller.

Read about Tulip’s $120M Series D 👉 http://tulip.co/press/tulip-secures-120m-series-d/

In this conversation, Chris Luecke, host of the Manufacturing Happy Hour podcast, joins Natan Linder to discuss AI in manufacturing, and how Mitsubishi Electric’s lead investment in Tulip’s $120M Series D helps to accelerate our mission to scale our composable platform, support an open ecosystem for frontline operations, and supports AI-enabled and human-driven innovation.

Augmented Ops is a podcast for industrial leaders, citizen developers, shop floor operators, and anyone else that cares about what the future of frontline operations will look like across industries. This show is presented by Tulip, the Frontline Operations Platform. You can find more from us at Tulip.co/podcast or by following the show on LinkedIn.

Special Guest: Chris Luecke.

AI is rapidly reshaping life sciences manufacturing—but as intelligent systems move into regulated environments, questions around validation, governance, and trust become unavoidable.

In this episode of Augmented Ops, host Michelle Vuolo, Head of Quality at Tulip, is joined by Bryan Ennis, Chief Quality Officer and Founder of Sware, and Martin Heitmann, of the Triality Group. Together, they explore what it really takes to deploy AI responsibly in pharma, biotech, and medtech operations.

The conversation examines why many AI initiatives stall at the pilot stage, how validation practices must evolve for probabilistic systems, and where organizations are already seeing real value—from predictive maintenance to quality signal detection and validation automation. They also discuss emerging regulatory guidance, including Annex 22, and why regulators are not anti-AI—but deeply skeptical of black-box systems.

Throughout the discussion, a consistent theme emerges: successful AI adoption is less about the technology itself and more about process design, data quality, human oversight, and building evidence that systems are safe, transparent, and fit for purpose.

This episode offers a grounded, experience-driven perspective on how life sciences organizations can move from experimentation to scale—without compromising patient safety or compliance.

Watch the full episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/7keK_4zDaTg

Augmented Ops is a podcast for industrial leaders, citizen developers, shop floor operators, and anyone else that cares about what the future of frontline operations will look like across industries. This show is presented by Tulip, the Frontline Operations Platform. You can find more from us at Tulip.co/podcast or by following the show on LinkedIn.

Special Guests: Bryan Ennis and Martin Heitmann.

Robotics has promised to transform manufacturing and logistics for decades — but turning intelligent machines into reliable, everyday operators remains hard. In this episode of Augmented Ops, Natan Linder sits down with Yaro Tenzer, co-founder and CEO of RightHand Robotics, to talk about what it actually takes to deploy AI-powered robotics in real operational environments.

Yaro shares lessons from building robotic systems that operate in the messiness of the real world — where data is imperfect, edge cases are constant, and reliability matters more than demos. Together, they discuss why so many robotics pilots struggle to reach production, how machine learning improves through real-world feedback, and what operations leaders should understand before investing in automation.

The conversation explores the intersection of robotics, AI, and operations — focusing on practical constraints, system design, and the human decisions that determine whether advanced technology delivers value or stalls on the shop floor.

Watch the full episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/a06GA7TvI8Y

Augmented Ops is a podcast for industrial leaders, citizen developers, shop floor operators, and anyone else that cares about what the future of frontline operations will look like across industries. This show is presented by Tulip, the Frontline Operations Platform. You can find more from us at Tulip.co/podcast or by following the show on LinkedIn.

Special Guest: Yaro Tenzer.

What does the future of process engineering look like in an era shaped by AI, automation, and rapid operational change? In this episode, Chris Luecke joins Natan Linder to explore how the role is evolving, what still defines great engineering, and why human judgment remains essential on the modern shop floor.

Chris is the host of Manufacturing Happy Hour and one of the most connected voices in the industry. Before stepping behind the microphone, he spent years as a process engineer at Anheuser-Busch and later worked across sectors with Rockwell Automation—giving him a rare vantage point on how factories actually run and how engineering teams solve problems.

Natan and Chris discuss the shift from reactive troubleshooting to systems thinking, how culture shapes the pace and quality of improvement, and why the most effective way to introduce AI is to aim it at the tasks teams collectively find painful. They also examine the idea of “Shenzhen Speed,” how faster design and production cycles influence global competitiveness, and what manufacturers elsewhere can learn from regions that move quickly.

This conversation offers an on-the-ground view of how engineering work is changing and what the next generation of process engineers will need to thrive.

Watch the full episode on YouTube

Augmented Ops is a podcast for industrial leaders, citizen developers, shop floor operators, and anyone else that cares about what the future of frontline operations will look like across industries. This show is presented by Tulip, the Frontline Operations Platform. You can find more from us at Tulip.co/podcast or by following the show on LinkedIn.

Special Guest: Chris Luecke.

AI is often described as a revolution, but every technological leap has deep roots in the human story. In this episode of Augmented Ops, MIT Professor and author David Mindell joins Tulip CEO Natan Linder to discuss how history can help us navigate the rise of intelligent systems.

Mindell, a historian, engineer, and entrepreneur, shares insights from his latest book, The New Lunar Society, which traces the origins of the Industrial Revolution and the people who built it. He draws connections between the 18th-century innovators who powered the first era of mechanization and today’s engineers shaping AI. Every tool, he argues, embeds human skill, judgment, and culture; from the earliest steam engines to modern autonomous systems.

Their conversation examines the enduring questions that define manufacturing and technology: How can new tools expand opportunity instead of narrowing it? What does responsible innovation look like in an age of automation? And how can societies balance ambition, governance, and trust while embracing change?

Through stories of invention, work, and rediscovery, Mindell reminds us that progress has always been a human endeavor. Technology evolves, but the drive to create, understand, and improve remains constant.

Watch the full episode on YouTube

Augmented Ops is a podcast for industrial leaders, citizen developers, shop floor operators, and anyone else that cares about what the future of frontline operations will look like across industries. This show is presented by Tulip, the Frontline Operations Platform. You can find more from us at Tulip.co/podcast or by following the show on LinkedIn.

Special Guest: David Mindell.

Manufacturing is entering a new phase of AI adoption, one where intelligent systems don’t just generate insights but take action in context. In this episode of Augmented Ops, host Mason Glidden, Tulip’s Chief Product Officer, is joined by Olga Stroilova, Group Product Lead, and Pete Hartnett, Group Product Manager, to discuss how agentic AI is redefining what’s possible on the factory floor.

Together, they unpack the evolution from predictive and generative AI to agentic systems capable of autonomous, goal-driven behavior while keeping people firmly in the loop. They examine why many pilots stall before production, how governance and culture shape adoption, and why “human oversight by design” is becoming the new standard for responsible AI in manufacturing.

Drawing from Tulip’s own roadmap and customer experiences, the team highlights how features like AI Composer, Tulip Agents, and context-aware workflows are helping users close the insight-to-action gap, scale AI safely, and unlock new forms of operational leverage.

Rather than imagining a future without people, the episode points to a more realistic vision of AI in manufacturing: one where systems evolve, but human judgment remains the foundation of progress.

Augmented Ops is a podcast for industrial leaders, citizen developers, shop floor operators, and anyone else that cares about what the future of frontline operations will look like across industries. This show is presented by Tulip, the Frontline Operations Platform. You can find more from us at Tulip.co/podcast or by following the show on LinkedIn.

Special Guests: Olga Stroilova and Pete Hartnett.

Kicking off Season 6, Natan and Tulip CMO Madilynn Castillo reflect on Operations Calling 2025—recorded just after nearly 800 manufacturing leaders, engineers, and frontline pros converged at Tulip HQ for Tulip’s biggest event to date. More than a showcase of technology, this two-day experience blended strategy, execution, and genuine community. Attendees dove into headline keynotes, fireside chats, interactive workshops, and panels, led by senior voices and industry experts driving the new era of manufacturing.

The episode captures how this convergence marked a real inflection point: AI moving from hype to hands-on tools like Tulip Agents, composable systems scaling across teams, and the shift from digital transformation to continuous transformation on the shop floor. Through live demos, open learning, and collaborative problem-solving, participants saw—and built—the next wave of operations-led innovation.

Packed with post-event momentum, Natan and Madi share stories and lessons that reveal how practical AI, human-centered design, and community are reshaping manufacturing’s future.

Augmented Ops is a podcast for industrial leaders, citizen developers, shop floor operators, and anyone who cares about what the future of frontline operations will look like across industries. This show is presented by Tulip, the Frontline Operations Platform. You can find more from us at Tulip.co/podcast or by following the show on LinkedIn.

Special Guest: Madilynn Castillo.

In this bonus episode, our guest is Liz Reynolds, manufacturing and workforce expert at MIT and strategic advisor to Tulip..

Fresh from Detroit's Reindustrialize conference, Liz and Natan share key insights on America's urgent push to bring manufacturing back home. They explore the "Spring of momentum" in reindustrialization efforts, from AI moving beyond hype to real implementation on the shop floor, and break down the massive scale challenges facing US manufacturers across critical sectors.

Drawing from major industry conferences including Reindustrialize, the Hill and Valley Forum, Industry Studies Association, and MIT's Initiative for New Manufacturing, she explains strategic workforce development approaches to address the 400,000 manufacturing worker shortage and the Department of Defense's $1 trillion budget impact on industrial capacity. Reynolds sheds light on how this Spring's discussions and strategic planning around technology adoption and workforce training are beginning to take concrete shape as the real work accelerates into Fall.

Augmented Ops is a podcast for industrial leaders, citizen developers, shop floor operators, and anyone else that cares about what the future of frontline operations will look like across industries. This show is presented by Tulip, the Frontline Operations Platform. You can find more from us at Tulip.co/podcast or by following the show on LinkedIn.

Special Guest: Elisabeth Reynolds.

This week marks the final episode of Season 5 of Augmented Ops! Natan and Erik look back and share their biggest takeaways from conversations with CEOs, frontline engineers, and operations leaders.

They unpack marketing hype vs. the current state of AI on the shop floor, the rise of citizen developers, and why “digital transformation” needs a serious rebrand.

They also dive deep into the demise of traditional MES, explore the shift toward composable, platform-driven architectures, and offer predictions on how adaptability will define manufacturing success in the year of the “composable operations.”

Augmented Ops is a podcast for industrial leaders, citizen developers, shop floor operators, and anyone else that cares about what the future of frontline operations will look like across industries. This show is presented by Tulip, the Frontline Operations Platform. You can find more from us at Tulip.co/podcast or by following the show on LinkedIn.