November 24, 2025

Axion Founder Daniel First on Solving the $4 Trillion Manufacturing Problem with AI

45 minutes

Axion founder Daniel First is building the command center for American manufacturing that detects product failures before they reach customers. His AI-powered observability platform links IoT data, technician reports, and customer feedback across aerospace, medical devices, and consumer products to identify emerging issues manufacturers don't even know exist. Born from watching enterprise AI pilots fail at McKinsey, Axion is architecting customer-centric manufacturing where products iterate in real time based on what's breaking in the field.

What You'll Learn:

The trillion-dollar quality crisis plaguing American manufacturing and how AI is solving it

Why most enterprise AI fails and what makes the rare successes different

The future of American manufacturing competing on speed of customer learning

How real-time field data is transforming product development cycles

Unconventional founder habits that enable exceptional speed and deep thinking

Chapters:

2:00 From Orthodox Debates to Independent Thinking
3:00 Neuroscience, Philosophy, and Human Flourishing
6:00 The Pivot from Academia to Industry
7:20 Predicting AI as the Next Cultural Mania
8:10 What Axion Actually Does for Manufacturers
10:35 The Invisible Quality Crisis Costing Trillions
13:30 Surprising Multi-Department Platform Adoption
16:02 Surgery Equipment Failure With Two Root Causes
16:47 Why Axion's Organization Looks Different
18:00 Building an Ecosystem Across Product Lifecycle
20:28 How Quality Data Drives Product Innovation
21:58 American Manufacturing Winning on Empathy
26:00 How Axion Succeeded Where 95% Fail
28:50 Why Robotics Will Create More Quality Issues
31:10 What Enterprise Leaders Think About AI
32:50 Data Centers and Manufacturing Tailwind
34:09 The Experimental Mindset Driving Speed
36:30 Why 2010s Advice No Longer Applies
38:40 The Vertical AI Revolution
39:55 Quick-fire Questions