Carlton Brule, CEO of Lase-X, had the right idea at the right time: Enable digital tracking of parts in the manufacturing process.
“The problem we’re trying to solve has always existed, but it’s accelerating now due to the complexity of modern supply chains and modern equipment, and just modern life in general,” Brule says.
In most manufacturing processes, critical parts are tracked via paper documentation after they’re made. Lase-X’s technology provides a digital identity for parts during the manufacturing process.
“What we did was build a laser tool that marks every part with a verified identity at the moment that it’s made,” Brule says. “That’s our core innovation, doing it in process and doing it within existing workflows, so that it’s a seamless experience for the manufacturer. It’s a value-add process for the manufacturer, it’s an efficiency boost for them, and ultimately it will give transparency throughout their supply chain.”
The need for a company like Lase-X was highlighted a few years ago when a company supplying flight parts was caught falsifying records, which resulted in planes being grounded, Brule says. Lase-X creates trust at the parts level, Brule says.
“Existing manufacturers have a paperwork system,” he says. “They make a part and a piece of paper gets attached to that part, and if it’s falsified or lost or damaged, that part has to get scrapped, and that could be a $10,000, a $100,000 part. Relying on paperwork is ultimately going to be a bottleneck within manufacturing in general. We want to solve that with the identity layer on the part itself, and a seamless experience for validating what your part is and any information about it.”
Lase-X spun out of Panasonic Boston Laboratory in 2024 with a core idea and prototype. Since then, the team has been working on building out the hardware and software. The company has customers for the hardware while its development work is focused on maximizing value for
larger manufacturers.
As CEO, the biggest challenge is switching between the engineering work and the development work, Brule says.
“There’s a lot of noise out there, and it takes time to determine what paths are valuable and what paths aren’t, because there’s only so much time in the day, or in the week, or the month to pursue all of these opportunities,” he says. “[The most rewarding part is] seeing our hardware and products out in the real world, marking parts, doing real work, and solving problems for manufacturers.”
