Sunrise Sip Club Archives - Expandable ERP

The policy environment shaping U.S. manufacturing—and today’s competitive landscape with China—is extremely complex. On March 19, 2026, fresh from a visit to China, Bruce Graham, investor, advisor, and board member, shared firsthand insights and real-world examples of how innovation is helping American manufacturers gain an edge and turn advanced technology into a competitive advantage. The discussion took place during Sip Club, hosted by Expandable Software, MIE Solutions, and Mirador Software Group.

Our discussion focused on three main areas:

Policy Overview: How government policies, such as “Made in America” rules and tariffs, protect routine production.
Innovation: Real examples of U.S. manufacturers succeeding through innovation rather than competing solely on cost or policy.
China: China’s role in global manufacturing today, including geopolitical and trade realities.

Context: U.S. policy initiatives

Manufacturing has a high multiplier effect in the economy. It is estimated that there is a $1.81 return for every $1.00 invested in manufacturing.

One manufacturing job supports four additional jobs elsewhere.
Manufacturing accounts for approximately 11% of U.S. GNP.

The Trump administration has discussed significantly expanding investment in advanced manufacturing through a coordinated, multi-agency strategy focused on workforce development, supply chain resilience, and emerging technologies such as semiconductors and next-generation materials. However, it remains to be seen when—and if—these initiatives will fully materialize. The U.S. government does not turn on a dime.

Key initiatives include:

Department of Defense: ManTech
National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST): Manufacturing Extension Partnership (training)
CHIPS Act: Semiconductor investment
Department of Energy: Next-generation materials
Departments of Commerce, Defense, and Energy: 17 research institutes focused on emerging manufacturing technologies

Opportunities exist through Department of Defense and Department of Energy grants and loans, as well as subcontracting under larger awarded contracts. However, the cost of preparing proposals and meeting ongoing reporting requirements can be significant—there is no free lunch.

Support for navigating these programs can be found in Decoding Grant Management by Lucy Morgan and at www.myfedtrainer.com.

Tens of billions of dollars in manufacturing investments have been announced—but when will they materialize?

Announced investments from companies such as Merck, AstraZeneca, Amgen, Novartis, Jabil, Hyundai, GE Appliances, Johnson & Johnson, and ABB
Nation-state commitments totaling approximately $1 trillion from the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Qatar, and South Korea

Enforcement is expected to tighten in 2025 with new legislation and administrative changes. Some startups are beginning to feel momentum building. However, government strategy documents often overlook a critical factor: fundability. This remains a central issue.

How does the U.S. succeed in this new global environment? Innovation. There are significant opportunities for leverage in U.S. manufacturing, including:

Simulation and digital twins (dynamic virtual replicas synchronized with real-time IoT and AI data)
Robotics to augment a constrained workforce
Integration of fragmented data systems and siloed organizations
Scaling effectively beyond Proof of Concept (PoC)

Common themes for improvement include supply chain resiliency, workforce development, and accelerating the transition from PoC to full-scale production.

Crossing the Chasm by Geoffrey Moore describes the challenge of moving from early adopters to the early majority. To scale successfully, companies must target a specific niche, deliver a complete “whole product,” and shift from technology-centric to value-based messaging.

Some U.S. manufacturers are succeeding through innovation—often by moving beyond commodity production toward differentiated products and new architectures that disrupt value and supply chains. Commodity widgets rely on barriers to trade and pressures from Made in America. Innovation is arguably a more sustainable/defensible place to play than relying on trade protections.

Graham provided examples of companies that have succeeded leveraging a strategy of innovation during the webinar:

CelLink (www.cellinkcircuits.com)
- Roll-to-roll manufacturing innovation enabling large-area, highly conductive power circuitsDeep IP and advanced technology create a strong competitive moatA DOE grant supported the construction of a 300,000 sq. ft. facility near Austin, Texas
- “Made in America” policies and tariffs have helped drive increased domestic demand
Scalvy (www.scalvy.com)
- Proprietary, patented technology enabling a modular (“Lego-style”) battery pack design
- Core innovation resides in firmware/software rather than manufacturing itself
- “Made in America” positioning remains important
SkyCool Systems (https://www.skycoolsystems.com/)
- Pivoted from commercial refrigeration efficiency to data center cooling
- Growth driven by the rapid expansion of AI-powered data centers

The elephant in the room: China

In the last 20 years, China has developed the ability to iterate, learn and scale VERY rapidly. XPeng (Alibaba backed) and Xiao Mi (an Apple plus Whirlpool type entity) have done this with Electric Vehicle (EV) production, supported by capital efficiency driven by grants, subsidies, and tax incentives.

At the same time, increased adoption of robotics and openness to cross-border collaboration have significantly improved capital and production efficiency.

Despite its large labor force, China is also heavily investing in automation, with approximately 150 humanoid robotics startups currently active. This pattern of overinvestment and overcapacity mirrors previous industrial waves.

As a result, China has achieved major advances in:

High-speed rail
Electric vehicles (e.g., BYD)
5G and broadband (e.g., Huawei)
Robotics
Semiconductors
Pharmaceuticals

Closing thoughts

There is no single “silver bullet.” (Is there ever?) The key takeaway is that the United States must focus on its strengths—particularly innovation and invention. Groups like The Council on Competitiveness, a U.S.-based nonprofit based in Washington D.C., work to strengthen economic competitiveness by bringing together leaders from business, labor, academia, and government to address key challenges and deliver high-value opportunities to the United States. This is accomplished through the sponsorship of conferences, seminars, and other special events used to develop new ideas and to circulate the council’s findings. The council makes recommendations that are presented to experts, government officials, media, policy makers, and the general public.

Other bright spots are that there are clear areas where the U.S. is succeeding, including:

Rapid innovation cycles
Supply chain efficiency improvements
AI-enabled productivity and training

Examples include:

LG LFP battery production in Michigan for Tesla
Investment in reliable, clean baseload energy (fission and fusion)
Jeff Bezos’ proposed $100B AI-driven manufacturing fund
Ford’s BlueOval City initiative in Tennessee
U.S. rare earth metal initiatives

About Sip Club

Sip Club is a monthly, online knowledge-sharing event sponsored by Mirador Software Group and its subsidiary companies. It is designed for manufacturing professionals in operations, finance, and IT. Each session provides a space to exchange ideas, learn from peers, and gain fresh perspectives from industry leaders.

About the Speakers

Bruce Graham is an investor, advisor, and board member with 22 successful liquidity events. Since 1991, he has helped scale high-value startups as a venture capitalist and co-founder. His portfolio includes companies such as LatentAI, Limber Robotics, CelLink, Scalvy, SkyCool, and Aquatrino.

Jeff Osorio is a consulting CFO with over 40 years of experience across companies ranging from pre-revenue to $4B. He has led more than 40 ERP implementations and currently advises emerging companies. He is also a former adjunct professor in the MBA program at Santa Clara University’s Leavey School of Business.

We talk with a lot of manufacturing leaders, and we’ve noticed the same challenges come up again and again in Sales and Operations Planning. Maybe these sound familiar:

Building a “forecast” by taking one big order from a customer and dividing it by 12 months, generating an inaccurate or obsolete forecast causing unnecessary inventory build-up.
Finding out that sales and operations “leaned forward” on procurement of inventory to meet lead time on a large upcoming order, only to find out it was delayed or cancelled, uselessly tying up cash.
Planning production based on only what’s already in the order backlog, instead of aligning with true future demand, causing extended lead times and potential lost sales.
Focusing on unit volumes only, and not factoring in product mix, seasonality, or margin impact, unnecessarily constraining available manufacturing capacity to handle spikes in demand.

These kinds of shortcuts feel efficient in the moment, but they often lead to missed targets, stockouts, reduction of cash, increase in inventory and misalignment between sales, operations and finance.

These problems and more were the focus of the new Sip Club, hosted by Expandable Software and MIE Solutions (subsidiaries of Mirador Software Group) on September 18^th, 2025. Once again, industry leaders gathered to discuss issues and share insights on their solutions, with David Gavlik, Chief Financial Officer of BSC Industries, as the featured guest.

So, what is sales and operations planning?

Sales and Operations Planning, or the S&OP Process, is a process by which a company consolidates forecast information from the various functions of the enterprise in a structured manner to prepare a business plan for the company and communicate and establish coordinated priorities for all parts of the organization.

“Sales and operations planning is a widely used, effective tool for gaining a greater degree of control over [a] company’s operations. Though the use of this tool, a company can coordinate the actions of each functional area through consistent, frequent links between the business plan and each department’s operations by

Orchestrating communications
Developing a realistic plan capable of achieving company objectives
Ensuring that each business decision is made with a deliberate view of its impact on the entire organization
Ensuring that purchasing is buying the correct items, manufacturing has the capacity to make items, and finance can pay for and forecast results, all in an effort to ensure customer demand is met.

“This dynamic process enables a company’s sales and marketing groups to carefully coordinate the impact of market demand with departments such as manufacturing, engineering and finance. The net result is a dramatically increased ability to anticipate changes in customer needs.” ^[1]

All companies perform this process in some sort of manner (though some are very informal) but if not organized and cross-functional, it can lead to incorrect, costly decisions.

Who needs to be involved in sales and operations planning?

The short answer is any function in the company that is involved with selling, producing and delivering products to customers. They include:

Marketing: Providing input regarding programs and company initiatives to promote various product lines and programs to influence future customer buying behavior.
Sales: The direct interface to the customer and product demand
Purchasing: To ensure they have the information needed to procure inventory in a timely fashion.
Operations: To ensure they have capacity and plans in place to handle upcoming customer needs.
Finance: Sometimes forgotten in this process, finance is the gatekeeper in challenging assumptions, monitoring cash flow, and updating financial projections and the impact to gross margin and overall profitability.

What are some typical S&OP failures?

Inventory buildup – With inaccurate or incomplete forecasts and being unable to react quickly enough to changing demand, inventories can increase dramatically.
Tying up available cash – “Leaning forward” on inventory purchases (aggressive forecasting) for large orders that are delayed or cancelled uselessly consumes cash.
Stock outs and/or long lead times impacting sales – Buying only to current demand and not to forecasted demand and sales can create shortages and missed revenue opportunities.
Uneven manufacturing capacity – Leading to long lead times and excess spending to compensate for demand spikes (this can occur by not considering seasonality of the industry or customer buying patterns).

To ensure and drive alignment across the organization on S&OP decisions, best practice says this is a formal recurring process and integrated with the financial planning process and projections.

What is the typical S&OP process?

Ideally in a manufacturing environment, this should be a regularly scheduled recurring meeting. In some cases, finance may lead the meeting as the coordinator and facilitator across the various functions.

Depending on the volatility, cycle times, size and complexity of the company, this meeting can be scheduled biweekly. If held too often, it can lose meaning and becomes repetitive; if not often enough, decisions can be missed; if not scheduled, it can lead to poor decisions.

The process is a cycle. Sales and marketing provide forecast data from their various perspectives which “syncs up” into a demand forecast (what I want). This is provided to manufacturing (including purchasing) to generate material and capacity planning and a response to the demand forecast (what I can produce). There may be multiple cycles here, but eventually a consensus is reached and provided to finance to generate the financial forecast. ^[2]

Who makes the decisions?

Ideally, it’s a group consensus with alignment. However, it is important to have an escalation process or overall decision maker.

Is someone in the S&OP meeting the final decision maker? OR
What is the process to decide if and when there is an impasse? (CEO/CFO/COO, etc.)

What’s the feedback mechanism?

For the S&OP process to be most effective, there needs to be a solid feedback loop to all the constituents. Specific details need to be provided to all involved as an outcome of the process.

Sales and marketing need to know what volume and mix of products will be available to sell.
Purchasing and manufacturing need to know what to buy and what to build.
Finance needs to know what will be built, what will be bought, what will be sold, and, most importantly, when, to build an attainable financial forecast and cash plan.

There is also a need for ongoing feedback during the ensuing period: sales communicating “what’s selling” and manufacturing providing what’s available (“what I’ve got”), turning the sales funnel into a megaphone (i.e., “I’m out of Prime Rib! Push the Meatloaf!”)

Turning the Sales Funnel Into a Megaphone ^[2]

What’s the bottom line?

The S&OP process works. It can be painful to start, but once it’s operating, it adds immense value to your business.

Thanks and credit to David Gavlik for his contributions and insights for the Sip Club.

David Gavlik is an operationally focused finance professional with 25+ years of financial experience in multiple products and industries (including biological products, complex hardware solutions, and storage / workspace equipment manufacturing and distribution) in companies ranging from $50-100M. https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-gavlik-7924666/

Jeff Osorio is a Consulting CFO with over 30 years of experience in operationally oriented companies ranging from pre-Revenue to $4B with over 40 ERP implementations in his portfolio. He is also an Adjunct Professor in the MBA program of the Leavey School of Business at Santa Clara University. https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeff-osorio-1412181/