00;00;02;27 - 00;00;08;04
Chet
Mel. Welcome to the inspired Execution mini series.

00;00;08;07 - 00;00;11;23
Mel
Great to be here. Thank you for the invite.

00;00;11;26 - 00;00;23;13
Chet
You were an electrical engineer and started your company more than 20 years ago right out of college. Let's go back to the very beginning. What got you interested in robotics?

00;00;23;15 - 00;00;46;17
Mel
I was walking down the hall one day and I was in school to become a Bose engineer, to design speakers. Just loved, sound, loved. Great. My uncle had some Bose speakers and blew my mind, and I saw a wheelchair driving down the hallway while I was in probably a senior. And it was using ultrasonics to position itself in the hallway so that it wouldn't run into the walls.

00;00;46;17 - 00;01;09;23
Mel
For someone who was less mobile, less able to steer themselves. And so that using a sound to control a robot just captivated me. So I chased down the robot, found out who was driving it across the building, and I just jumped in with both feet from there. I volunteered. I bugged the boss, the professor, for a couple of months.

00;01;09;23 - 00;01;22;25
Mel
He finally got stuck in an elevator with me. And I said I said I would sort bolts whatever it took. And so I did sort bolts for weeks and weeks and then ultimately was able to manage a team and spin up.

00;01;22;28 - 00;01;43;23
Chet
So many success stories about people being stuck in elevators like so many of them. Right. Because there really is not much you can do there. Right. So it's stuff that is that is that is awesome. So Autonomous Solutions Inc, Tell us about your vision for autonomous Solutions World domination.

00;01;43;25 - 00;02;09;24
Mel
I think the only way to do it, yes, I was raised on a farm in Canada and so driving in a circle 16 hours a day was my life. And so believing that humans were made for something more, that's creative and less about doing these mind numbing, dull, dirty, dangerous jobs. And so I became very passionate about that.

00;02;09;29 - 00;02;25;14
Mel
And so when John Deere came and saw a paper that I wrote and asked if we would do autonomous farming with them, we jumped at the opportunity. And ultimately they said, if you start a company, we will send you product development money and let's do this together.

00;02;25;17 - 00;02;47;00
Chet
Wow. What's the vision like? Is it is it still going to be is still going to be industrial robots? If I could if I'm not probably phrasing it correctly Or do you want to you want to go off and also say residential? How do you think about is I right all over, you know, solving all problems. Right.

00;02;47;04 - 00;03;18;15
Mel
Yeah. The the question of the hedgehog and where can you truly lead the world. We felt like the industrial robot space. So farming and construction and mining and logistics, material handling, that is an area where we've worked for years and years where we're not fighting against these multibillion dollar automotive autonomy groups that have billions of dollars. And one car accident away from being crushed.

00;03;18;18 - 00;03;45;18
Mel
Yeah, which we have seen recently. And so we know those industries are people were on farms and worked construction and things like that. So we have a great pedigree as far as people with that background, very passionate about farming and keeping the farmers in business, even when they can't get the labor, the the hands on side of it, that you can limit your safety risk.

00;03;45;20 - 00;04;22;05
Mel
And so our our vision really is to be that source like solution provider for optimizing the mine site to we have a mining customer who says we cannot get carbon neutral unless we have autonomy that has that intelligence to manage all the battery flow and the power surge that's needed to charge mining trucks that are electric. And so optimizing your resources, your fuel, your electricity and helping that miner be the most efficient in the industry, that farmer being the most efficient and moving grain, that construction company.

00;04;22;07 - 00;04;35;15
Mel
And so that that's really the opportunity. And the vision is that SAS kind of company providing the AI and machine learning kind of intelligence to optimize those operations.

00;04;35;18 - 00;04;46;26
Chet
So is it is it is this a true statement that you are that you have the largest deployment of autonomous vehicles in the world? Well.

00;04;46;28 - 00;05;33;03
Mel
Let's see. I would say we have the largest cross platform. So in mining there are $5 million trucks. We've made the most in the world last year of autonomous trucks, but they're very low quantities in material handling in factories. We have thousands of unit out there, but there are companies with many more in factory robots. And so I would say we're the we have the most breath to we have farming vehicles, we have mining vehicles, we have construction vehicles, we have factory vehicles that are all doing autonomy and that we leverage this common platform to automate and optimize these functions.

00;05;33;05 - 00;06;03;06
Mel
So I think some we're we're right at the point of scale, right, that there is no standard functional safety regulations for like we're working on golf course motors right now. Yeah SoftBank came in and said we want to fund you. Masa just bought a bunch of golf courses and wants an autonomous golf course. And so but there are no standards that are for autonomous vehicles in a golf course.

00;06;03;09 - 00;06;27;14
Mel
And so we're out there adapting. How do you avoid going over a hill at full mowing speed when there's a three year old on the other side and keeping it safe? So we're learning as we're going, we have commitments for hundreds of units, but we have to make sure that we're checking all those boxes with the safety as we're learning what is safe enough to keep people comfortable and really scale.

00;06;27;16 - 00;06;53;18
Chet
That's awesome. That is so cool. So AI and ML have been around for a long time, but things are getting the things are going faster, right? So for those who don't know, right, who are not in the technology as much, you know, given in robotics. Right. Given given your leadership and role in the industry, what you know, how does it play into robotics?

00;06;53;20 - 00;06;58;27
Mel
Oh, well, that is a fun one because it is controversial still. It is.

00;06;58;27 - 00;06;59;25
Chet
Yeah.

00;06;59;27 - 00;07;43;16
Mel
And it's really hurting like you see, I don't know how much GM and their cruise solution was using AI, but the biggest debate in deploying of these autonomous vehicles in the public is the functional safety. And yeah, with air you really can't prove functional safety as it's historically been proven, meaning through ISO 26262 standard, you can set up your analog anti-lock brakes such that when they fail, they fail safe and you can put the redundancy and all the mechanical linkages based on one and a billion meantime between failure kinds of mechanical electrical logic, where with AI and machine learning, it's learning as it goes.

00;07;43;16 - 00;07;45;12
Mel
You can't put math around the safe.

00;07;45;18 - 00;07;46;09
Chet
Yeah.

00;07;46;12 - 00;08;06;19
Mel
And so some people are trying that and then getting shut down. They'll get a letter from the federal government saying cease and desist unless you can prove your safety like this, this and this. And they can't. And so how we're using machine learning and AI is to bring value to the solution, but it can't be the safety case.

00;08;06;22 - 00;08;33;22
Mel
So we can detect the difference between trees and fence posts and grass and humans and help the vehicle move more intelligently in in response to what's around it. But it can't be the safety case. The challenge in automotive where they're using AI and machine learning to try to get there, they can't get away from that human is the oversight that they use with all the lawsuits because you just can't prove safety.

00;08;33;22 - 00;08;42;20
Mel
You can't get to a meaningful functionally safe base case. So that's where we use it. We use it when you're getting a low tire, you're a great.

00;08;42;21 - 00;08;43;06
Chet
Way to look at.

00;08;43;06 - 00;08;56;03
Mel
It. The vehicles learning, it's getting smarter, it's operating more effectively. But you cannot at least to get any kind of approvals and really to be comfortable that you have a safe solution.

00;08;56;05 - 00;09;20;18
Chet
And you think we you think it'll be like this forever or you think that this is a point in time and over time because because people equate, you know, I just make a shift. People think about Jenny I is Chad shipped right and this and everything being in the cloud, you know, there could be specialized limbs. You could have a safety lamp, for example, and that the federal government can approve at some point because it's open source.

00;09;20;20 - 00;09;27;10
Chet
Right. Do you see that kind of evolution happening at some point or is it doing so?

00;09;27;10 - 00;09;50;10
Mel
But it's it's going to be a while because, yeah, as you're seeing now that human the court cases always go back to the human should have been watching the he was the one who was ultimately responsible and unless you can prove like if you have the AI and the learning going on, there's no boundary to what it's learning, right?

00;09;50;10 - 00;10;12;14
Mel
You could train it wrong. You can have the chat shaped like situation where it's giving you wrong answers. Do you buying that? And and then it's really the lawsuits and that financial impact. It doesn't take many lawsuits to shut you down so correct. It's really tough. And so when will the public be comfortable knowing we'll save a bunch of lives?

00;10;12;14 - 00;10;28;04
Mel
And that's Elon's story, right? We will save lives. We will lose some. But it's the corporate and their money and their profits that finance the death of my son. And so, yeah, it's it's brutal.

00;10;28;06 - 00;10;44;16
Chet
Yeah, it's very there's a very stark comparison. And you have to be careful. I actually like the way you talked about it, which is there are some things we won't use it for, for quite some time to come, but there are many, many things we'll use it for. Yeah, right. But we will not go, we will not touch safety.

00;10;44;18 - 00;10;48;03
Chet
We will not let A.I. come into the world of safety for now.

00;10;48;05 - 00;10;52;29
Mel
And I would say the regulating bodies are saying that. Yeah.

00;10;53;01 - 00;11;17;01
Chet
Yeah, that's that's awesome. So let's let's shift gears, talk a little bit about leadership. I read I read an article a long time ago at Harvard Business Review, and at the end there was this really nice quote, Real leaders move the human heart. And it's always it's always been with me as somebody that, you know, I started out my career at next, right?

00;11;17;01 - 00;11;34;27
Chet
It was something that Steve did really well. How do you how how would you if you had to put a sentence or a phrase together, what would you say would be your version of leadership? Like how what would the essence of your leadership style be?

00;11;35;00 - 00;12;09;18
Mel
I can say what I aspire to, which is really that level five that is talked about by John Collins and the the willpower and the humility. It took me 16 years to really learn that humility was the ultimate leadership value and that if you can get that, that you can move hearts, that you are you're going to get the best solutions out of a room because that leader is going to have that psychologically safe team that all feel like they can speak up.

00;12;09;20 - 00;12;33;02
Mel
You have a leader who's willing to go with the second best decision from his perspective and choose someone else's on the team. And so humble would be the single word that I would bring to the most effective leaders. But it has to be coupled with that will that we are going to salute. I am going to make it.

00;12;33;02 - 00;13;00;13
Mel
It's not meek and mild and I'm not going to. Yeah, stand up and make a decision and push with everything and ensure that everyone gets on board. What we call is seek to understand, seek to be understood and get on board with the second best decision like it was your own. And so if that leader is seeking to understand everyone's perspective, they're seeking he is seeking to be understood by them.

00;13;00;15 - 00;13;11;11
Mel
And then whatever the decision is made by him that everyone gets on board as if it was their own decision. And second best meaning it wasn't their own.

00;13;11;14 - 00;13;28;00
Chet
That's awesome. Love that, Love that. What what could you have told a younger version of yourself to be a better leader sooner?

00;13;28;03 - 00;13;52;12
Mel
Part of it was that that took me 16 years to really realize that that that was the core value. And so because it's very hard to change an organization once it's formed and you have all of these leaders in place and now you're like, are humility is the number one enabler and you've brought in people from big corporations from around the country.

00;13;52;14 - 00;14;25;12
Mel
Now you've got to try to shape change, too. Humility is the hardest personality trait to influence, because by its definition, it rejects influence, right? That if you're prideful, that rejects any influence. And so, man, is it hard to change an organization and the leadership. So I would say double down on defining your values so that you're filtering early because it is incredibly hard to change it after.

00;14;25;15 - 00;14;57;08
Mel
So that's a biggie. I think the leveraging mentors more, I think that would be something that it's very hard to find in this lonely journey, to find other people who, yeah, are in the same place. And so it is a lonely time and you're making mistakes the first time. Learning from other people's mistakes. Fly to the valley, fly somewhere and get with the people who are in your tribe of lonely leaders.

00;14;57;14 - 00;15;00;07
Mel
I would say that would be the second.

00;15;00;10 - 00;15;29;02
Chet
You know, it's funny email. I always, whenever I end up doing a bit of advising, I would say that I've been most people would say, Chet, that's mentoring and and my my thing is always I want to be the person I want to be to you, the person. I never had that right. And so the idea that that's the discussion is about, you know, you will know your business better than I will, You will know your childhood issues better than I will ever.

00;15;29;04 - 00;15;51;14
Chet
And so I just want to be a sounding board of problems that you were thinking about at 330 in the morning. Aha. Right. Because. Because those ones you should feel we should build a relationships that secure enough that that you feel completely comfortable having those discussions because I don't want to make you know it's not about judging you right It's about you being successful and having somebody you can talk to about this love.

00;15;51;14 - 00;15;53;10
Chet
So I love. I love. Yeah, I love.

00;15;53;10 - 00;16;06;28
Mel
You, too. It's a lonely, lonely journey. And to have someone like that would be invaluable. So, like I say, fly anywhere it takes. Luckily, yeah, we have interfaces like this, but that that would be a biggie for sure.

00;16;06;29 - 00;16;30;14
Chet
No, that's. That's awesome. Let's talk a little bit about the future. Lots of people are afraid of machines replacing humans, but there's a lot of productivity to be gained with our humans and machines. And you've been doing this for a while, right? And so what does this mean for the future of work in your industry?

00;16;30;16 - 00;16;59;26
Mel
Yeah, it's an exciting time because that's no longer what we're being asked by our our customers or the manufacturers in these industries because they cannot get help. Yeah. And so right now we were talking to one of the largest farmers in the world and they can't get the labor and they're they're buying them from out of country to come in on special visas.

00;16;59;28 - 00;17;21;28
Mel
We talk to golf course owners. They say we know we can't get people, the young adults, to get out of bed at 4 a.m. to come over us. We know what's in three years we will not be able to. And we talked to one of the largest construction companies in Japan and they said our average wheel owner operator is 70 years old, seven zero.

00;17;22;01 - 00;18;00;22
Mel
Wow. And we are in trouble. The young adults today where they're playing video games and the dopamine adrenalin, they have no interest in driving in a circle all day. Yeah, they'll load this all day and and so it it is desperation levels in mining. They're parking mining trucks because they can't get the labor to go to them and that's why we're like in Australia, we're running the mine site from 800 miles away with the autonomous mining trucks so the people can stay home in Perth and not have to fly away from their family for two weeks and run 12 hour shifts and be miserable in bad weather conditions and those kind of things.

00;18;00;22 - 00;18;11;18
Mel
So I would say there's billions of dollars to be had and just fulfilling the gap in labor that we have left and are predicting that.

00;18;11;21 - 00;18;36;20
Chet
So your it's really interesting in the office environment, people are worried about automation, by the way, just like they were with the Internet, like the way they were reclined. So when with mainframe, you're not fighting that you are being invited, you're you to exactly the opposite. You're like, everybody is calling you in the industries you're in and saying, Please, Mal, please solve this problem for us because we have a labor shortage.

00;18;36;23 - 00;19;12;16
Mel
Yeah, we're we're actually starting an equity crowdfunding campaign next month. We cannot keep up with the demand like those guys that came from Japan. We have to have a solution. We don't have development capital, but we want to buy units from you now. Please. And we're hearing that in ag construction, mining, logistics. So how do I capitalize that and not lose out on the world domination QUEST And have to exit after 3 to 5 years where we're trying to build the world leading platform SAS model for these kinds of industries?

00;19;12;16 - 00;19;24;06
Mel
So that's that's the quest we're on. They are pleading for us. It is desperate right now. And so that's exciting. And we just want to make sure we funded so we can keep the dream alive.

00;19;24;09 - 00;19;45;01
Chet
Note to self to participate in that round so that that's that's that. That'll be easy. Thank you very much. And and we'll make sure that you know as this comes out if you if it's in time we actually mention where people if they do want to participate can and can click on our you are then go off and try to participate in it so that would be fun.

00;19;45;02 - 00;20;12;17
Chet
Yeah, that's that's awesome. All right. So any any any thoughts on what are the emerging trends in automation that you look forward to just this year? Is there something you know, with everything happening, you see something that is going to be that's going to be a big shift based on what's happening this year? Or is it just more of what's happened last year and the year before?

00;20;12;19 - 00;20;37;14
Mel
I would say we've seen a shift in the desperation from we need these to we see the the beginning of the end for our business unless we can get them. So I would say the spike of demand is what we've seen different. And the storm we're hearing brewing right now. So last 12 months, this 12 months, I would say the demand is desperate.

00;20;37;16 - 00;21;05;27
Mel
There are huge gaps in the safety standards and those kinds of enablers that allow it to really scale. But I, I would say that's really it. The technology's moving nicely. I is not going to change a ton in the near term because of the safety factor, but it is going to help us develop faster and bring in your automated testing so that your code is more reliable.

00;21;06;00 - 00;21;06;28
Chet
Correct.

00;21;07;00 - 00;21;32;08
Mel
The sensors have really arrived, I would say, from the automotive industry where we are able to run 24 seven in a mining environment with dust and rain and snow. We had mining trucks in the Ukraine and snowstorms and sandstorms in Australia and the radars and the light sensor fusion is now very solid and we're running safely a lot.

00;21;32;08 - 00;21;44;20
Mel
So I would say sensors are here, computers are here, A.I. will make us faster. Labor shortage is going to be the demand that scales the industry.

00;21;44;20 - 00;22;03;19
Chet
So I know for sure. For sure. That's awesome. All right. Next, we're going to go into the rapid fire part of our of our episode. Boy, So I'm going to ask you things really quickly, quick answers from you. So first one, if you could automate one thing in your life, what would it be?

00;22;03;21 - 00;22;06;19
Mel
Washing clothes.

00;22;06;21 - 00;22;13;24
Chet
You mean you mean actually not just washing it, actually drying them and then folding them and making them ready. Right. All of it.

00;22;13;24 - 00;22;21;01
Mel
Yes. Okay, great. That's the one thing I'm not helping my wife on, and I really know I should be, so.

00;22;21;04 - 00;22;28;09
Chet
That's awesome. What world problem would you like robots to solve?

00;22;28;11 - 00;22;44;20
Mel
Can world robots? Can robots solve world peace? I think that's that's the biggie is, man, we got a lot of fighting going on. It would be nice to resolve that. Can robots come in and bring prosperity to the Palestinians so they don't feel locked in to.

00;22;44;21 - 00;22;45;24
Chet
Correct.

00;22;45;26 - 00;23;03;02
Mel
Just all of those? Russia doesn't feel like they have to go and steal someone else's grain, whatever that delivers. Right? Wrong, wrong. Can automation help lift us so that we don't have to go after others Resources and their standards of living I think would be wonderful.

00;23;03;05 - 00;23;11;26
Chet
What sector of manufacturing will be automated first?

00;23;11;29 - 00;23;34;28
Mel
There's been some great progress. So I think the we're pretty well, they're on welding and some of those things, the assembly is the hard part. So I would say that that's really the next biggie is can we really get some of these fine motor skills like the Elon Musk humanoid that could put wheel lug nuts on a wheel?

00;23;35;03 - 00;23;38;29
Mel
I think those. That's a biggie.

00;23;39;02 - 00;23;44;25
Chet
How many years till the manufacturing industry is completely automated?

00;23;44;28 - 00;23;49;16
Mel
Like nine.

00;23;49;18 - 00;23;49;27
Chet
I was.

00;23;49;27 - 00;23;52;02
Mel
Going to say you're going to round up three point.

00;23;52;02 - 00;23;53;02
Chet
275.

00;23;53;07 - 00;24;00;09
Mel
Right? That's yeah, I don't want to round up to ten because that's a people have been saying Highway.

00;24;00;14 - 00;24;02;10
Chet
40 for about ten years.

00;24;02;12 - 00;24;24;07
Mel
Yes. Yes. And then we just keep moving that ten minute ten hour, ten year window out. I do think that what's coming, it's fairly structured environment. We don't have the functional safety concerns. We've got some great robot kind of interactive robots that keep people safe around them. So I'm pretty optimistic there. I think the the highway is the harder part.

00;24;24;10 - 00;24;36;04
Chet
Though. No, for sure. In a phrase, what does the future hold for Asi beyond world domination? That's a yes.

00;24;36;06 - 00;24;56;07
Mel
Our vision statement for our people is to make it a place you'd want to work even if you were a millionaire. And I would say that that is the quest. That's why I don't take bad money, no matter how scary it is on the day to day is that people will perform the greatest when we're treating each other in a way that we'd still come back to tomorrow if we were millionaires.

00;24;56;10 - 00;25;13;04
Mel
And that's the quest come hell or high water that we are in the pursuit of that we've made everybody, owners of the company through an ESOP, and we believe that we can be optimal in our performance if we treated each other in that way.

00;25;13;06 - 00;25;22;14
Chet
That's awesome. Mel, it's been such a pleasure. We really, really appreciate it. I think the audience is going to absolutely love this episode.

00;25;22;17 - 00;25;28;18
Mel
It was so great to be here. I look forward to staying in touch and can't wait to see this. So thank you for that.

00;25;28;18 - 00;25;31;26
Chet
You know and will and Will and we'll see you in the Bay Area soon. Thank you again.

00;25;32;02 - 00;25;34;04
Mel
We will. Thanks so much. That they care.

Inspired Execution

Mel Torrie

CEO and Founder

Robotics, AI, and Shaping the Future of Industrial Automation with Mel Torrie

Episode Transcript