Twitter/X

Kieran Velasquez spent two months visiting German Mittelstand companies—working…

2026-08-05 · 13:07 UTC ·@tugot17 ·0 min read

Brief

@tugot17 recounts meeting Kieran Velasquez in Berlin in April; Kieran then spent two months embedded with German Mittelstand firms—working on shop floors and living with factory owners—to study how to revive U.S. manufacturing. Kieran published his findings as a Substack article released last week (noted 2026-08-05), which the author calls transformative and highly recommended.

Why it matters

Kieran Velasquez spent two months visiting German Mittelstand companies—working in factories and even living with factory owners—to learn how to bring manufacturing back to the United States.

Key details

  • @tugot17 met Kieran in Berlin in April, calls him “one of the most hard-working and impressive people I know,” and says Kieran’s Substack article released last week (post shared 2026-08-05) is “one of the greatest things I’ve read this year” that changed what’s worth working on.
Source evidence

In April I met this random American guy in Berlin who'd come to Germany to learn how to bring manufacturing back to the US 🇺🇸.

He spent the next 2 months visiting Mittelstand companies scattered across Germany 🇩🇪, working in factories, even living with some of the factory owners.

This person was Kieran Velasquez - one of the most hard-working and impressive people I know, who also became a great friend.

Last week he released all he learned as a Substack article, and it is one of the greatest things I've read this year.

check it out - it made me update on what's actually worth working on"