Drew Baglino

My team was super awesome in Lathrop, California in 11 months.

It was a JCPenney warehouse.

11 months later, the first product came off the line.

But ultimately, what it comes down to is alignment.

when you're working with your local jurisdiction, they can use the process for a code-compliant project to say no at every step, or they can say yes at every step.

And so how do we as a collective, you know, gain alignment that building, re-industrializing the U.S., building critical infrastructure and supporting our critical supply chains here in the U.S.

is a good thing, and identifying ways to say yes at every step along the way and really accelerate these processes versus no.

And when you do find that, it can be magical.

That's been my experience.

Yeah.

I mean, today's factories are really automated.

If you're building a new factory today, you know, in China or the U.S., the labor differential is less than 10% of cost of goods sold.

It might even be less than 5%.

But what actually is driving the competitiveness of the different locations, in my mind, is it comes down to supply chain.

And how do we develop co-located critical supply chains in the United States where the logistics costs are much, much shorter and much, much lower because the logistics time is much, much shorter?

If you look at, you know, China, they are so thoughtful about building these industrial areas.

You know, everything that you could possibly need to build a car, which has 7000 parts in it, you know, is within less than a three hours drive.

Getting to that kind of co-location of the supply base in the United States would be a major unlock, along with automation, while still providing immense numbers of high-paying, important jobs.

I think that's a vision that I'd like to advocate for.

A hundred percent.