AB Andrew Berglund On The Space Policy Show

“There's the silver tsunami idea: a lot of the mom-and-pop machine shops are heading into a retirement wave, they don't have an obvious successor, and they might just close shop. It can literally be a handful of those shops supplying a small but critical part of the space supply chain. Everybody wants to be a founder. Can we bring some people to be sustainers, to step into those businesses and carry that critical work forward?”

The Space Policy Show · Policy · November 2026

Context

Asked for policy fixes to space supply-chain risk, Andrew Berglund says the government lacks good data on the lowest tiers of suppliers. His example is small machine shops with no successor lined up.

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Transcript

The Space Policy Show Around 41:39 into the episode

Andrew Berglund

…should be really busy helping inform policymaking right now because things are changing so quickly. And I think space, by virtue of being relatively small in sort of this competitive landscape, really needs to be on its front foot in being responsive and thinking through these challenges.

Colleen Stover

…So, you mentioned some how numbers can inform decision making and measurements. What are some other kind of potential policy solutions to some of the risks that we've talked about? I mean, we've talked about workforce, of course, we've talked about upstream things, we've talked about imports.

Andrew Berglund

I think the first is partly a data issue. I think we need better data on the lower tiers of the space supply chain and where those weaknesses are and how that's changing in a very dynamic time. I think one thing I'm interested in is how can government sort of bring that supply-side investment into the lower tiers of the supply chain? So, we hear a lot about the sort of silver tsunami idea of a lot of the mom and pop machine shops and folks like that that are going to be in this retirement wave, they don't have an obvious successor for those companies, and they might just close shop, right? Like, that might just be the end. And it can literally be a handful of those things that are supplying, maybe it's again small in quantities, but sort of a critical part of the space supply chain. I don't think we're doing it nearly enough to identify where those weaknesses are and target investments there, right? Like, can we bring everybody wants to be a founder? Can we bring some people to be sustainers to step into those businesses and carry that sort of really critical work forward that's spread all over the country, right? Like, these are state-level programs and national-level programs can both be really directed…

Colleen Stover

Interesting. I'm picturing, if anybody does this, you heard it here first. I'm picturing an apprenticeship program where we're training up new workforce, but at the state level to take over these mom and pop garage garage places and keep the supply chain resilient. Yeah, Jackie, what do you think…

Jacklyn Buhrmann

So, I think one thing that comes to mind for me when we're thinking about policy tools is using the policies that you already have access to carefully. There are things like the DPAS, the defense priorities and allocation system, is that right? Where suppliers can get ratings through DPAS to get…

Colleen Stover

Andrew, any last words? We're almost at time here, so I wanted to offer you something.

Speaker names come from our own diarization. The position is estimated from where the line sits in the episode.

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