Walks on West Cliff

AI Opportunities in Hardware Product Development and Operations

On a recent walk with Bob Machlin, Founder and Principal Consultant of GenAI Ignite, we discussed how AI is reshaping both operations and business growth for product development and manufacturing companies.

Here are two insights that stood out:

⚙️ Operations

For teams that have clearly defined and documented workflows, AI tools like Open AI ChatGPT or Google Gemini can accelerate document analysis and creation, streamline process flows, and even automate routine tasks. This means faster cycle times, fewer errors, and more bandwidth for engineers to focus on higher-value work.

📈 Business Growth

Customer behavior is shifting. Instead of starting on a company’s website, buyers increasingly turn to trusted third-party sources and AI-driven search. This is fueling a transition from SEO (Search Engine Optimization) to GEO (Generative Engine Optimization), where large language models surface answers instead of humans. To stay visible, firms must ensure their content across websites, industry media, and social platforms is optimized for AI discovery.

AI isn’t just a back-office tool — it’s fast becoming a critical enabler for competitiveness in the hardware product ecosystem.

👉 Now it’s your turn: What AI opportunities are you seeing in your business?