🎙️ Maneva is building video-based AI agents that plug directly into real-world manufacturing environments and deliver real-time insights across safety, uptime, quality, and process improvement without changing the floor layout or installing a new camera system.

This week on TOOL OR DIE, we talk to Rae Jeong, Maneva co-founder and CEO. From his roots in a blue-collar Alberta town to AI research at Google DeepMind, Rae shares how his experience in robotics, factory work, and frontier AI led to Maneva’s mission: to democratize high-performance factory intelligence through edge-deployed, reinforcement-learning-driven video agents.

We cover the surprisingly hard edge of video AI in manufacturing—from jammed conveyors and missed safety protocols to process drift and equipment failure—and how learning systems trained on video, not just static images, might define the next wave of manufacturing optimization.

Timestamp:

01:00 – From South Korea to Alberta to DeepMind: Ray Kim’s unusual path06:30 – What AI at DeepMind taught him about the limits of research10:30 – Why he left DeepMind to start Maneva13:00 – Maneva’s core pitch: video-to-action AI for messy, real-world factories17:00 – Why reinforcement learning on the edge matters21:00 – Mission-critical AI that integrates with PLCs, not the cloud24:00 – Beyond defect detection: using AI for downtime and predictive maintenance28:00 – Introducing Kaizen: factory-wide root cause analysis across agents31:00 – Real-world RCA: how video caught a missing prep station34:00 – The cost of jams and what video AI can really prevent

Key Topics:

* Edge-deployed AI in high-variance, high-volume environments

* Reinforcement learning vs pretraining for real-world reliability

* Why video (not “vision”) matters in industrial intelligence

* Video-based RCA: identifying bottlenecks and preempting downtime

* Oneva’s broader thesis: Kaizen 2.0 powered by AI agents, not binders

🔧 Learn more: Maneva.ai

Sponsor

This episode of TOOL OR DIE is brought to you by DOSS, the adaptive ERP.DOSS kills implementation hell by working directly with your team, connecting all your systems to minimize data entry so you can focus on production. Instead of barging in like a bull in a china shop, they take a deep look at your actual operations and build a system that matches how you operate today, replacing only the parts that need improving—rather than trying to fix what’s already working great.

DOSS — One Platform, Total Visibility

TOOL OR DIE is hosted by Joel Johnson, former science & tech journalist turned corporate strategist who built brands like Gizmodo, WIRED.com, and Wirecutter; and Alex Roy, General Partner at New Industry Venture Capital (NIVC.us), known for breaking the Cannonball Run record and his work in autonomous vehicles. Each week, they speak with the people actually rebuilding American manufacturing—one machine, one company, one idea at a time.

Follow them at:LinkedIn: joeljohnson | alexroyX: @joeljohnson | @alexroy144

Kevin William is a car journalist. He keeps going to China to drive new Chinese cars, write about what he sees and experiences and feels with his own two hands. But his reports about the rapidly increasing quality of Chinese cars for InsideEVs.com over the last year have been controversial for Western audiences, many of whom simply can’t believe a really easy-to-fathom, if painful concept: Chinese cars aren’t just really good now. They might be better than every other car being made.This episode isn’t about politics or U.S. ambition—it’s about reality. About what happens when you ignore a competitor for too long, and then wake up to find they’ve leapfrogged you. From the software-defined vehicle myth to the quality gap between Tesla and Chinese EVs, Kevin walks us through how and why the Chinese car industry matured so fast and why so many in the West still don’t get it.

Timestamp:

01:00 – Kevin Williams’ viral “Chinese cars are good” reporting05:00 – Debunking software-defined vehicles in the West08:00 – BYD, Xiaomi, and China’s EV quality edge12:00 – IP theft vs. learning by doing: what’s really going on18:00 – Nationalism, media backlash, and the fragility of Western auto pride24:00 – Why OEMs ignored China’s rise—and now regret it30:00 – Which Chinese brands are actually good? And which are failing?34:00 – Tesla’s fading advantage in China38:00 – What U.S. and European automakers need to do—now

Key Topic:

* How Chinese EVs leapfrogged Tesla in infotainment and ride quality

* Why "IP theft" isn’t the core issue—complacency is

* OEMs’ blind spot: millions of sales in China, zero situational awareness

* The backlash to truth-telling in auto journalism

* InsideEVs’ Kevin Williams on what Western execs won’t say out loud

🔧 Read Kevin's latest: InsideEVs.comSponsor

This episode of TOOL OR DIE is brought to you by DOSS, the adaptive ERP.DOSS kills implementation hell by working directly with your team, connecting all your systems to minimize data entry so you can focus on production. Instead of barging in like a bull in a china shop, they take a deep look at your actual operations and build a system that matches how you operate today, replacing only the parts that need improving—rather than trying to fix what’s already working great.

DOSS — One Platform, Total Visibility

TOOL OR DIE is hosted by Joel Johnson, former science & tech journalist turned corporate strategist who built brands like Gizmodo, WIRED.com, and Wirecutter; and Alex Roy, General Partner at New Industry Venture Capital (NIVC.us), known for breaking the Cannonball Run record and his work in autonomous vehicles. Each week, they speak with the people actually rebuilding American manufacturing—one machine, one company, one idea at a time.

Follow them at:LinkedIn: joeljohnson | alexroyX: @joeljohnson | @alexroy144

🎙️ Not every manufacturing company is a giant or a startup. Some are still family-owned companies slogging it out, making key components that look simple but involve detailed problem solving every single day.

Numberall Stamp & Tool Co. is a family-run, rural Maine manufacturer making industrial marking tools for everything from lobster traps to Apollo missions. You’ve probably touched something they helped serialize—metal tags, numbered seals, marked valves—and never known it.

But the company’s real story is in its resilience. Founded during the Great Depression to stamp poultry leg bands, Numberall grew into a small but essential supplier for defense, aerospace, medical, and heavy industry. Now in its third generation, it’s modernizing under pressure—holding tight tolerances, adding CNC machining, and training the next wave of machinists (when they can find them), all from a town of 800 people.

Daniel, Alex, and Dieter—two generations of the Numberall family—join TOOL OR DIE to explain how rural manufacturers survive offshoring, boom-bust cycles, and demographic shifts. From WWII bomb sights to GE medical cuffs to engraved tags on the moon, this episode explores what legacy craftsmanship looks like when it’s still alive and evolving—and what it will take to pass it on.

Timestamps

01:00 – Numberall’s founding: chicken bands and rotary stamps in 1930s New York04:00 – The move to Maine and becoming a three-generation family business07:00 – What modern industrial marking looks like—and why it still matters10:00 – Surviving downturns: dot-com crash, 2008, COVID, and inflation14:00 – CNC modernization and cutting down weeklong jobs to hours17:00 – Why tight tolerances matter in precision stamping21:00 – Small team, long tenures: how to grow without losing legacy skills25:00 – Workforce scarcity in rural towns and the automation trade-off30:00 – From Apollo to Saudi oil rigs: Numberall’s surprising global footprint34:00 – The role of human-readable marks in a digital supply chain37:00 – Made in Maine: rebuilding manufacturing from small-town shops40:00 – What federal support would actually help Main Street manufacturers

Key Topics

* Numberall’s 95-year evolution and intergenerational leadership

* How industrial stamping still outperforms lasers in speed and simplicity

* Tight tolerances and raised engraving: the machining behind the marks

* Surviving multiple manufacturing downturns as a small supplier

* The strategic role of rural U.S. manufacturers in global supply chains

* CNC upgrades and macro programming for legacy products

* Why reshoring alone isn’t enough: training, capital, and market access

* Engraving bomb sights and stamping serials for the moon missions

🔧 Learn more: numberall.com

Sponsor

This episode of TOOL OR DIE is brought to you by DOSS, the adaptive ERP.DOSS kills implementation hell by working directly with your team, connecting all your systems to minimize data entry so you can focus on production. Instead of barging in like a bull in a china shop, they take a deep look at your actual operations and build a system that matches how you operate today, replacing only the parts that need improving—rather than trying to fix what’s already working great.

DOSS — One Platform, Total Visibility

TOOL OR DIE is hosted by Joel Johnson, former science & tech journalist turned corporate strategist who built brands like Gizmodo, WIRED.com, and Wirecutter; and Alex Roy, General Partner at New Industry Venture Capital (NIVC.us), known for breaking the Cannonball Run record and his work in autonomous vehicles. Each week, they speak with the people actually rebuilding American manufacturing—one machine, one company, one idea at a time.

Follow them at:LinkedIn: joeljohnson | alexroyX: @joeljohnson | @alexroy144

🎙️ Magnets without rare earths. Didn’t even know it was possible. Yet Niron Magnetics is making them in Minnesota and very soon the rest of the world.Simply put, what Niron has done is one of the most exciting and important industrial-scale innovations happening in the United States today. Magnets are critical in the electric motors that power everything from EVs to drones to robotics.

But current magnets, like the ones in almost everything you own, need “rare earths” to function—rare earths that are sometimes mined in the United States, but never processed here. Which is why China often uses them as a trade lever, as they process more rare earths than any other country.

Niron changes all of that, using a process that requires no rare earths and is even more powerful than what’s available with standard neodymium magnets.

It’s huge.

Niron CEO Jonathan Rowntree joins TOOL OR DIE to explain how Niron’s tech could transform everything from EV motors to defense drones to data center cooling—and why America’s magnet crisis is bigger than most people realize. From the legacy of the Manhattan Project to the geopolitical chokehold of Chinese exports, this is a deep dive into the guts of the devices that run our world, and the urgent need to build domestic capacity from the atom up.

Timestamps

01:00 – What’s so hard about neodymium? And what is Niron doing differently?04:00 – A rare earth-free magnet: iron nitride and how it works07:30 – The environmental and geopolitical risks of traditional rare earth magnet supply11:00 – Coming out of stealth and the global rare earth crisis 2.014:00 – Commercial pilot facility launched; full-scale factory coming in 202717:00 – Performance gains: higher thermal stability, motor efficiency improvements21:00 – Small motor demand: drones, humanoid robots, and data center cooling25:00 – Scaling U.S. magnet production from grams to 10,000 tons29:00 – The capital challenge: what funding hard tech actually requires33:00 – IP protection, cyber threats, and building a team for scale36:00 – Why domestic magnet production could drive reshoring of entire supply chains40:00 – What else needs to be rebuilt: copper, steel, automation, and skilled labor

Key Topics

* Iron nitride as a rare earth-free alternative to neodymium magnets

* The technical and geopolitical vulnerabilities of global magnet supply

* Niron’s commercialization roadmap: pilot facility to 10,000-ton factory

* Motor design, thermal stability, and efficiency performance tradeoffs

* Strategic applications: EVs, drones, defense, data centers

* Reshoring through component innovation: building near demand

* U.S. capital markets and the gap in scaling hard tech

* The future of skilled labor in an automated manufacturing world

🔧 Learn more: nironmagnetics.com

Sponsor

This episode of TOOL OR DIE is brought to you by DOSS, the adaptive ERP.DOSS kills implementation hell by working directly with your team, connecting all your systems to minimize data entry so you can focus on production. Instead of barging in like a bull in a china shop, they take a deep look at your actual operations and build a system that matches how you operate today, replacing only the parts that need improving—rather than trying to fix what’s already working great.

DOSS — One Platform, Total Visibility

TOOL OR DIE is hosted by Joel Johnson, former science & tech journalist turned corporate strategist who built brands like Gizmodo, WIRED.com, and Wirecutter; and Alex Roy, General Partner at New Industry Venture Capital (NIVC.us), known for breaking the Cannonball Run record and his work in autonomous vehicles. Each week, they speak with the people actually rebuilding American manufacturing—one machine, one company, one idea at a time.

Follow them at:LinkedIn: joeljohnson | alexroyX: @joeljohnson | @alexroy144

🎙️ It’s easy to think America doesn’t manufacture anything, but it’s simply not true. But one of the open questions around manufacturing in 2025 is simply: what if American manufacturing were more connected? What if the factories, logistics partners, and service providers already exist but need a new kind of network—one with actual business operations answers—to unlock them?

Chris Nolte is a co-founder of Bloom, a Detroit-based operations marketplace (but with national reach) that helps emerging hardware companies scale. From electric motorcycles to autonomous robots and prefab homes companies, Bloom is helping hardware founders match with domestic manufacturers and logistics partners, then helping both sides finance, communicate, and operate with maximum speed.

Bloom is hard tech grease.

Nolte talks with TOOL OR DIE about the long tail of American manufacturing: why so many companies outsource by default, why so few people know that critical suppliers are still here, and how Detroit’s legacy supply chain can—and must—diversify beyond cars. From tariffs to tooling, high-mix manufacturing to culture change, Chris cheerfully explains the real reasons reshoring is hard to a hard-headed idiot (me) and what it’s going to take to make it work.

Thanks again to Newlab Detroit and Michigan Central for hosting us. We’ll be publishing a few more episodes than usual over the next few weeks; we met several great companies in Detroit and don’t want to sit on episodes.

Timestamps:

01:15 – What Bloom does: connecting hardware startups with overlooked U.S. manufacturing04:00 – Beyond matchmaking: Bloom’s tools for financing, best practices, and logistics07:15 – Why reshoring isn’t just patriotic—it’s strategic risk management10:00 – Rethinking vertical integration and the myth of doing everything in-house13:45 – The “missing middle” in American manufacturing: why scale is so hard17:00 – Can Detroit build something that’s not a car? Why it must22:00 – The hidden factories: who’s assembling TVs and scooters in the U.S. right now26:00 – The real limiter: tariffs that penalize domestic production30:00 – Why communication—not tech—is the real bottleneck for U.S. suppliers33:45 – Bloom’s future: automating matching with AI, building the “Shopify for manufacturing”37:00 – Rebuilding industrial culture with Zoomers, grit, and mutual respect

Key Topics:

* Building a modern network of domestic suppliers, 3PLs, and service shops

* The real costs and incentives behind offshoring—and what’s changing

* The bottleneck of American "medium-scale" manufacturing

* Tariffs, rare earths, and supply chain gaps

* Using software and shared infrastructure to de-risk hardware startups

* Detroit’s next chapter—and why it must extend beyond the automotive industry

* Cultural challenges in U.S. factories—and how better communication changes everything

* What it takes to speed up reshoring without giving in to nostalgia

🔧 Learn more: BuildWithBloom.com

Sponsor

This episode of TOOL OR DIE is brought to you by DOSS, the adaptive ERP.DOSS kills implementation hell by working directly with your team, connecting all your systems to minimize data entry so you can focus on production. Instead of barging in like a bull in a china shop, they take a deep look at your actual operations and build a system that matches how you operate today, replacing only the parts that need improving—rather than trying to fix what’s already working great.

DOSS — One Platform, Total Visibility

TOOL OR DIE is hosted by Joel Johnson, former science & tech journalist turned corporate strategist who built brands like Gizmodo, WIRED.com, and Wirecutter; and Alex Roy, General Partner at New Industry Venture Capital (NIVC.us), known for breaking the Cannonball Run record and his work in autonomous vehicles. Each week, they speak with the people actually rebuilding American manufacturing—one machine, one company, one idea at a time.

Follow them at:LinkedIn: joeljohnson | alexroyX: @joeljohnson | @alexroy144

🎙️ Global trade data used to be buried in bureaucratic sludge until Dave Applegate turned it into ImportYeti, a tool for transparency (if you’re a shopper) and competitive advantage (if you’re building a competitor). It’s a really great tool just as a piece of UX on top of customs data. And that Dave and his team have built a business on top of it for power users—basically building the Bloomberg terminal for international shipping—is so clever.

Dave joins TOOL OR DIE to explain how he’s made international shipping records searchable, visual, and dead simple to use for anyone, from journalists to supply chain strategists.

This episode isn’t just about customs data, though: it’s about what that data reveals. From revealing where most leather jackets are actually made (hint: not in New York or even Texas) to exposing how many companies quietly source goods from countries with poor labor practices, Dave’s perspective born from years soaking in manifests and supply chain problems reframed many of our presumptions about the last few years of impact from pandemics and tariffs.

Dave also walks us through the real post-COVID supply chain shifts (and what didn’t happen), the geopolitics of nearshoring and transshipping, and how companies are navigating tariffs, IP theft, and the long tail of ESG.

And most importantly: why adult diaper imports are more geopolitically significant than you think.

Timestamps

00:00 – What is Import Yeti? Open customs data, visualized and searchable02:45 – From making mugs to mapping trade flows: the origin of the platform04:30 – The viral value of searching company imports (and the serious business behind it)06:45 – Why companies are finally moving away from China—slowly09:10 – Ecosystems drive manufacturing hubs: from Silicon Valley to Pakistan leather11:45 – Should the U.S. build a new Shenzhen—or many specialty zones?13:00 – Why no one changed their supply chains after COVID14:30 – China, ESG, and the illusion of ethical sourcing17:00 – What happens when Vietnam has its own China moment?18:30 – Reverse engineering global supply: Vietnam ≠ Mexico ≠ Pakistan21:00 – Will rising economies adopt IP law—or repeat China’s playbook?23:00 – Who pays for deeper insights? How Import Yeti’s model works25:00 – Custom trade data as a tool for industrial planning and due diligence27:00 – Tariff whiplash: the real impact of trade policy volatility30:00 – The “de minimis” loophole and why it may finally be closing32:00 – What data doesn’t show: raw materials, commodities, and the limits of visibility34:00 – Transshipping and tariff dodging: the hidden reality of many “non-China” imports36:00 – Sex objects, adult diapers, and the unexpected scale of niche imports37:30 – Why America still lacks manufacturing for strategic essentials like PPE

Key Topics

* Making government trade data accessible—and why it matters

* Global supply chain realignments post-COVID, post-ESG, post-China

* Tariffs, transshipping, and the search for non-China manufacturing

* Data as leverage: sourcing, competition, and compliance

* The blind spots of global trade transparency

* What America didn’t build after COVID—and why it might matter next time

🔧 Learn more: ImportYeti.com | U.S. Customs Data Explained | UFLPA & Forced Labor InfoSponsor

This episode of TOOL OR DIE is brought to you by DOSS, the adaptive ERP.DOSS kills implementation hell by working directly with your team, connecting all your systems to minimize data entry so you can focus on production. Instead of barging in like a bull in a china shop, they take a deep look at your actual operations and build a system that matches how you operate today, replacing only the parts that need improving—rather than trying to fix what’s already working great.

DOSS — One Platform, Total Visibility

TOOL OR DIE is hosted by Joel Johnson, former science & tech journalist turned corporate strategist who built brands like Gizmodo, WIRED.com, and Wirecutter; and Alex Roy, General Partner at New Industry Venture Capital (NIVC.us), known for breaking the Cannonball Run record and his work in autonomous vehicles. Each week, they speak with the people actually rebuilding American manufacturing—one machine, one company, one idea at a time.

Follow them at:LinkedIn: joeljohnson | alexroyX: @joeljohnson | @alexroy144

🎙️ America’s drinking water infrastructure is aging—and out of sight can’t keep meaning out of mind. But what if we could see inside the systems that keep our cities alive to make smarter and more timely repairs?

Motmot is building inspection robots that do exactly that—swimming through water pipes under cities like Detroit, delivering critical insights before leaks turn into catastrophes. This week on TOOL OR DIE, we sit down with the company’s chief engineering officer Cale Colony (and graduate researcher at University of Michigan’s field robotics program) to talk about field robotics, municipal decay, and the long tail value of putting cameras—and AI—where no one’s looked before.

From his Iowa farming roots to submarine design, Cale walks us through the evolution of agricultural automation, the limits of vertical farming, and why he sees water infrastructure as one of America’s most neglected and fixable challenges. It’s a conversation about the future of cities, the power of simple solutions paired to complex machinery, and the hidden vascular system under our streets.These are the first of several podcasts recorded at Newlab Detroit on the Michigan Central campus. Thanks to both for hosting us—we’re long on Detroit’s future as a manufacturing powerhouse that draws on the genius and know-how of its engineering and scaling experts.

Timestamps:

01:15 – The Motmot mission: building tiny robots for municipal water pipes04:00 – Hardware as a service: inspection robots, tethers, and recovery06:45 – Design constraints: no GPS, SLAM in pipes, power vs communication10:10 – Blue Robotics chassis, neutral-buoyancy tethers, and hull adaptations13:00 – What kinds of pipes matter most: potable vs sewer vs steam15:00 – Where old cities lose water—and why most don’t notice18:30 – How cities like Detroit or Flint overbuilt their water infrastructure22:00 – GIS systems, asset mapping, and the cost of knowing what you own25:00 – Sensors: vision, acoustics, ultrasonics, and future modular packages28:00 – Tuberculation, sediment buildup, and keeping the robot centered30:30 – Modeling pipe decay with visual data (and not knocking off the rust)32:00 – From submarines to agtech: the founder’s path through robotics35:00 – What robotics could do for diversified farming and food sovereignty38:00 – The case for small, smart, bio-diverse farms—and robots to support them41:00 – Lessons from vertical farming failures and what comes next

Key Topics:

* Why America’s water infrastructure is leaking—and no one’s looking

* Design and deployment of modular inspection robots for public utilities

* The value of mapping municipal water systems, especially in older cities

* Tuberculation, corrosion, and the hidden life cycle of metal pipes

* Agricultural robotics and the future of biodiversity-driven farms

* Why vertical farming failed, and what could work instead

* Using automation to re-localize and decentralize food and water systems

* Robotics as a long-tail strategy for environmental and civic resilience

🔧 Learn more: Motmot.ai | University of Michigan Field Robotics GroupSponsor

This episode of TOOL OR DIE is brought to you by DOSS, the adaptive ERP.DOSS kills implementation hell by working directly with your team, connecting all your systems to minimize data entry so you can focus on production. Instead of barging in like a bull in a china shop, they take a deep look at your actual operations and build a system that matches how you operate today, replacing only the parts that need improving—rather than trying to fix what’s already working great.

DOSS — One Platform, Total Visibility

TOOL OR DIE is hosted by Joel Johnson, former science & tech journalist turned corporate strategist who built brands like Gizmodo, WIRED.com, and Wirecutter; and Alex Roy, General Partner at New Industry Venture Capital (NIVC.us), known for breaking the Cannonball Run record and his work in autonomous vehicles. Each week, they speak with the people actually rebuilding American manufacturing—one machine, one company, one idea at a time.

Follow them at:LinkedIn: joeljohnson | alexroyX: @joeljohnson | @alexroy144

🎙️ We want more factories in the U.S. For better products, for growing the middle class, for national pride and national security.But not everything America once made is coming home—and certainly not immediately. So how should we be thinking about the future—and power—of American manufacturing on a global scale?Elaine Dezenski—senior advisor at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and head of its Center on Economic and Financial Power (CEFP)—joins TOOL OR DIE to deliver a clear-eyed assessment of America’s industrial strategy (and historical lack thereof), the backlash to China’s global Belt and Road Initiative, and the growing awareness that America’s market idealism might be served by understanding that the economy can be a coordinated force.

Elaine argues that we’re already in a hot economic war—and we’re fighting it without the direction of an economic Pentagon. From misunderstood assumptions about the global order to the scramble for supply chain resilience, this episode connects the ideological, geopolitical, and deeply practical implications of reshoring and ally-shoring. Her proposal? A new economic architecture rooted in shared democratic values and strategic co-production—and more integrated decision-making between industry, capital, and government.

Timestamps::01:15 – Peter Zeihan’s “End of the World” and U.S. maritime dominance04:00 – The myth of globalization: who benefits in a fractured order?06:30 – Why North America is well-positioned in a decoupling world08:00 – Nearshoring vs. ally-shoring: what's the real strategy?10:00 – Arctic trade routes, rare earths, and geopolitics at the poles12:00 – China's Belt and Road backlash and the illusion of soft power15:00 – The limits of authoritarian infrastructure diplomacy17:00 – Defining “ally-shoring” and its policy architecture20:00 – Can a hemispheric economy replace the global order?24:00 – Strategic tariffs, capital incentives, and building an iPhone in America28:00 – FDD’s evolution: from counterterrorism to economic statecraft31:00 – Reindustrialization as bipartisan economic defense34:00 – Smart power vs. soft power: what really moves global outcomes38:00 – The case for a new “economic Pentagon” and an American-style industrial policy44:00 – U.S. foreign investment: friends, foes, and forgotten guardrails48:00 – If Fukuyama was wrong, what comes next?

Key Topics:

* Why the U.S. needs a coordinated industrial strategy now—not later

* The hidden costs of China's Belt and Road Initiative

* How reindustrialization can be framed as a national—and democratic—security imperative

* Why North America could anchor a new “near-global economy”

* Building prosperity through values-driven co-production

* What the Foundation for Defense of Democracies is actually doing in this fight

* The missed opportunity of the Apple iPhone myth

* Economic warfare tools vs. free-market dogma

🔧 Learn more: fdd.org | Elaine Dezenski on LinkedInSponsor

This episode of TOOL OR DIE is brought to you by DOSS, the adaptive ERP.DOSS kills implementation hell by working directly with your team, connecting all your systems to minimize data entry so you can focus on production. Instead of barging in like a bull in a china shop, they take a deep look at your actual operations and build a system that matches how you operate today, replacing only the parts that need improving—rather than trying to fix what’s already working great.

DOSS — One Platform, Total Visibility

TOOL OR DIE is hosted by Joel Johnson, former science & tech journalist turned corporate strategist who built brands like Gizmodo, WIRED.com, and Wirecutter; and Alex Roy, General Partner at New Industry Venture Capital (NIVC.us), known for breaking the Cannonball Run record and his work in autonomous vehicles. Each week, they speak with the people actually rebuilding American manufacturing—one machine, one company, one idea at a time.

Follow them at:LinkedIn: joeljohnson | alexroyX: @joeljohnson | @alexroy144

🎙️ Austin Bishop, co-founder of the New American Industrial Alliance (NAIA)—known by most as the people behind the REINDUSTRIALIZE conference—joins TOOL OR DIE to explain how an engineering kid from Cleveland ended up helping create one of the most influential gatherings in American manufacturing.

From early days of Atomic Industries to igniting a movement, Austin breaks down the convergence of venture capital, legacy SMBs, and policy leaders that’s driving America’s reindustrialization wave. REINDUSTRIALIZE isn’t another trade show—it’s a new convening model for serious builders, capital allocators, and government leaders reshaping U.S. industry, one where old heads and new make plans to accelerate American manufacturing.

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 – On location at the Reagan Library02:14 – Austin Bishop joins: from Cleveland roots to venture capital04:45 – Founding Atomic Industries and confronting the tooling bottleneck10:00 – Why venture capital ignored manufacturing until supply chain collapse14:00 – How REINDUSTRIALIZE started as a small meetup and went viral20:00 – The real mandate: connecting capital, operators, and policymakers26:00 – Why REINDUSTRIALIZE avoids the trade show model33:00 – Building a true cross-sector network: startups, SMBs, primes, and government38:00 – The European industrial retreat vs. U.S. industrial resilience44:00 – Reindustrialization as a nonpartisan national security imperative50:00 – Why longtime U.S. manufacturers remain skeptical—and why that’s logical55:00 – The last firms standing: SMBs thriving after 50 years of offshoring pressure1:02:00 – Innovation isn’t always tech—it’s often business model expansion

Key Topics:

* Why tooling remains the hidden bottleneck for global manufacturing

* How venture capital is finally waking up to industrial capacity gaps

* The accidental product-market fit behind REINDUSTRIALIZE’s rapid growth

* Bridging venture, policy, defense, and legacy industrial operators

* The deeply rational skepticism inside America’s remaining industrial base

* The structural advantage the U.S. holds over Europe in industrial policy

* Reindustrialization as a politically non-aligned but nationally urgent project

* How SMBs are evolving to capture defense and government work

🔧 Learn more: reindustrialize.com

TOOL OR DIE is hosted by Joel Johnson, former science and technology journalist and corporate strategist who pioneered brands like Gizmodo, WIRED.com, and Wirecutter, and Alex Roy, a General Partner at New Industry Venture Capital (NIVC.us) known for breaking the Cannonball Run record and his work in autonomous vehicles. Each week, they speaks with the people actually rebuilding American manufacturing—one machine, one company, one idea at a time.

Follow them at:

* LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/joeljohnson | linkedin.com/in/alexroy

* X: @joeljohnson | @alexroy144

🎙️ Nate Ames helps run a very clever program at Ohio State University. While the “Center for Design and Manufacturing Excellence” is an official arm of the school, it functions more like a paid internship. Hundreds of students have worked on real projects from over 150 companies, learning not just skilled trades and engineering, but also how to work within the same type of corporate and team structures they’ll be plopped into when they graduate.

It’s like a trade school and an internship all in one—hands-on access to machines and project management—and it’s setting a template for future hybrid programs at universities around the country.

In this episode of TOOL OR DIE, Nate explains why universities have failed to keep up with the pace of American industry—and how CDME is getting young people up to speed. By running like a startup and building with undergrad students instead of just grad students, CDME is turning research into real products and students into deployable talent.

From running R&D projects for DARPA to building design-for-manufacture workflows with startups, CDME is rewriting the playbook for academic innovation and reshoring-ready manufacturing.

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 – Intro and TOOL OR DIE updates02:08 – Nate Ames joins: from machining entrepreneur to CDME leader05:25 – What universities get wrong about product development09:40 – How CDME runs like a job shop with students on the line13:15 – Solving the “valley of death” between research and manufacturing17:30 – Why DARPA cares about DFM—and what that means for startups22:50 – Student-built parts that actually go into fielded defense products28:00 – How CDME scales from prototypes to production without breaking the model34:10 – What startups misunderstand about manufacturing38:00 – The reshoring moment and what’s needed to sustain it

Key Topics:

* Why academic R&D often fails to cross into real-world production

* CDME’s unique model: acting like a job shop, building like a startup

* Turning paid student labor into manufacturing muscle

* Design-for-manufacturing (DFM) as a national security issue

* Creating deployable talent pipelines, not just credentials

* Bridging institutional knowledge with urgent, real-world problems

🔧 Learn more: cdme.osu.edu

Tool or Die is hosted by Joel Johnson, former journalist, corporate strategist, and builder of brands like Gizmodo, Jalopnik, and Wirecutter. Each week, he speaks with the people actually rebuilding American manufacturing—one machine, one company, one idea at a time.

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