RVs are homes that go 60 miles an hour. That changes everything about what goes inside them.

Chris sits down with Sean Petterson, CEO of Supersede, a company combining recycling and manufacturing in an unexpected way - turning recycled plastic into structural building materials. Supersede started with boats, where wood has an obvious problem - boats get wet!

From there, the company moved into RVs, where the materials face constant movement and thermal cycling, on a production line that can build an entire RV in a couple of hours.

Sean also explains the thinking behind Supersede's manufacturing model, including why he'd rather build 10 smaller plants than one big one.

In this episode, find out:

• How running production lines in mirrored pairs cuts the distance operators walk across the floor
• Why an RV, built to go 60 miles an hour, is a harder test for a material than a house that never moves
• How Supersede built its own ERP with zero software developers, piecing it together through Slack, Jira, and GitHub instead
• How a pre-sold capacity threshold - already dropping fast - decides when Supersede builds its next plant
• How embedding machine vision and LiDAR on the line replaces a QA machine that would otherwise cost far more
• Why Sean thinks manufacturers who didn't start using AI a year ago are already a decade behind

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Tweetable Quotes:

• "If you hadn't gotten on the AI bus 12 months ago, you're a decade behind." - Sean Petterson, CEO of Supersede
• “A big contributor to those inefficiencies is, frankly, just legacy that gets embedded.” - Sean Petterson, CEO of Supersede
• “In manufacturing, things can move slow, and we just have the unique benefit of making sure that we're investing effectively, but very efficiently.” - Sean Petterson, CEO of Supersede

Links & mentions:

• Supersede is a manufacturing company turning recycled plastic into structural building materials, starting with its Marine Board product for the marine and RV industries.
• Harmoni is a factory orchestration platform that connects what's happening on your shop floor with the systems you already use, from your machines and operators to your ERP, giving your team one real-time view of production.
• PTC's Industrial Newsletter - a quick hit of clarity on how design, manufacturing, and service data can work together for manufacturing leaders looking to modernize.

Make sure to visit http://manufacturinghappyhour.com for detailed show notes and a full list of resources mentioned in this episode. Stay Innovative, Stay Thirsty.