I work across manufacturing, quality assurance, and process development.
I consult for manufacturing organizations on physical goods production, quality systems, and process improvement.
Success Story
Led the development of a pharmaceutical-grade botanical compound for Pfizer
Success Story
Led the development of a pharmaceutical-grade botanical compound for Pfizer
Michael knows the ins and outs of highly regulated industries. He's been in the field and leading the way. No one else can cut through the noise and see what efficiencies and improvements can be made.
Dan Russell
Cofounder of One Moksha
Michael knows the ins and outs of highly regulated industries. He's been in the field and leading the way. No one else can cut through the noise and see what efficiencies and improvements can be made.
Dan Russell
Cofounder of One Moksha
Michael knows the ins and outs of highly regulated industries. He's been in the field and leading the way. No one else can cut through the noise and see what efficiencies and improvements can be made.
Dan Russell
Cofounder of One Moksha
10+ happy clients
5+ years of experiences
20 years of experience
Trusted by many
Deep systems expertise
International reach
20 years of experience
Deep systems expertise
International reach
20 years of experience
About Me
20+ years in physical goods manufacturing and quality systems.
Focused on product safety, consistency, and accessibility. Research, process development, and cross-functional coordination with scientists, engineers, and manufacturers.
Cofounder, Cromogen Biotechnologies and Nevada Laboratories. Developed scalable processes for active pharmaceutical ingredient production: organic certification, process chemistry, water-soluble formulations. Teams contributed to extraction methods, ingredient standardization, and compliance practices supporting FDA and USDA regulations.
Led projects in engineering, product design, and market expansion across multiple industries.
Emphasis on problem-solving, efficiency, and collaboration. Building systems and products that function in complex and changing markets.
Services
Understand your systems, find efficiencies, scale your organization.
Success Stories
Repeatedly joined organizations pre-revenue or pre-market. Established revenue channels, resolved operational problems, and led exits.
Juul Labs + Pax Labs
Pre-revenue Ploom. Joined at four people. Built what became Pax Labs. PAX was miniaturized into JUUL.
Juul Labs + Pax Labs
Pre-revenue Ploom. Joined at four people. Built what became Pax Labs. PAX was miniaturized into JUUL.
Juul Labs + Pax Labs
Pre-revenue Ploom. Joined at four people. Built what became Pax Labs. PAX was miniaturized into JUUL.
Huawei Consumer
Pre-US mobile revenue. Consultant for US market entry. Managed transition to AndroidOS.
Huawei Consumer
Pre-US mobile revenue. Consultant for US market entry. Managed transition to AndroidOS.
Huawei Consumer
Pre-US mobile revenue. Consultant for US market entry. Managed transition to AndroidOS.
Olive UK
Developed oral delivery product with inhalable-equivalent performance. Oversaw pharmacokinetic trial design and user experience validation.
Olive UK
Developed oral delivery product with inhalable-equivalent performance. Oversaw pharmacokinetic trial design and user experience validation.
Olive UK
Developed oral delivery product with inhalable-equivalent performance. Oversaw pharmacokinetic trial design and user experience validation.
Evergreen Retail
Created an operational blueprint for an emerging market. Still in use across retail and manufacturing.
Evergreen Retail
Created an operational blueprint for an emerging market. Still in use across retail and manufacturing.
Evergreen Retail
Created an operational blueprint for an emerging market. Still in use across retail and manufacturing.
Case Study #1
Operational Turnaround in California's Early Cannabis Market
Market Context
Context for the method requires understanding the operating environment. In the mid-2000s, the California medical cannabis market operated under contradictory state and federal law. Under state law (Proposition 215), dispensaries were permitted to operate as non-profit collectives, serving patients with a doctor's recommendation. However, under federal law, all cannabis activity remained strictly illegal as a Schedule I controlled substance.
This created a high-risk, unstable ecosystem with profound operational consequences:
Unbankable Operations: Banks, being federally regulated, refused to service cannabis businesses. This forced the entire industry to operate exclusively in cash, creating massive security risks and making standard accounting nearly impossible.
Lack of Professional Standards: The talent pool consisted largely of cannabis advocates and legacy operators, not professionally trained business managers. The culture prioritized passion over process.
Data and Record-Keeping: With no access to banking, credit, or standard software, businesses were run from shoeboxes of receipts and handwritten ledgers. There was no verifiable data, no reliable system of record, and therefore no way to professionally manage the business
The Challenge
Addressing Losses Exceeding $1M
Engaged by a West Hollywood dispensary posting over $1M in annual losses despite high customer volume. Root cause was a failure of asset management: untracked loss of cash and high-value inventory.
Purpose
Immediate objective: stop financial losses by implementing systematic controls. Secondary objective: demonstrate that a professionally managed operation could generate sustained profitability.
Service
Provided owners with a clear and accurate operational picture for the first time. Created a structured work environment for employees.
Execution
The approach applied standard business discipline in an industry that lacked it. Brubeck implemented a simple but non-negotiable protocol:
Strict Inventory Control: Every gram of product was tracked from the moment it entered the facility to the moment it was sold.
Mandatory Shift Audits: At the beginning and end of every single work shift, a new manager would conduct a physical inventory count and reconcile it against the cash register's sales records.
Zero-Tolerance for Discrepancy: Any variance between the physical inventory on the shelves and the sales recorded in the register had to be accounted for immediately. The era of unexplained "leakage" was over.
Brubeck is the rare combination of big-picture strategic thinking (all while being able to take it all the way down to the ground floor practical level). His mind works faster than I've seen most entrepreneurs, and he still has the ability to meet the moment, the people, and the problems exactly where they are. He has an insatiable thirst for execution and running through the tape of every obstacle and problem he's ever faced. He's a home run for any organization.
Joe Mechlinski
2x NYT Best-Selling Author: Grow Regardless, Shift the Work
Brubeck is the rare combination of big-picture strategic thinking (all while being able to take it all the way down to the ground floor practical level). His mind works faster than I've seen most entrepreneurs, and he still has the ability to meet the moment, the people, and the problems exactly where they are. He has an insatiable thirst for execution and running through the tape of every obstacle and problem he's ever faced. He's a home run for any organization.
Joe Mechlinski
2x NYT Best-Selling Author: Grow Regardless, Shift the Work
Brubeck is the rare combination of big-picture strategic thinking (all while being able to take it all the way down to the ground floor practical level). His mind works faster than I've seen most entrepreneurs, and he still has the ability to meet the moment, the people, and the problems exactly where they are. He has an insatiable thirst for execution and running through the tape of every obstacle and problem he's ever faced. He's a home run for any organization.
Joe Mechlinski
2x NYT Best-Selling Author: Grow Regardless, Shift the Work
Phase 1 Results
Results:
Operational Result
The business achieved stable profitability. The model was sound; execution had been the issue.
Strategic Result
The method was replicable. Applied across fourteen units, producing a predictable profit stream. Combining single-unit companies resulted in larger exit multplier.
Impact
The financial success was not treated as an end in itself, but as the fuel for a higher purpose. The profits generated by this new operational efficiency were channeled directly into Cottage Housing, a Sacramento nonprofit dedicated to ending homelessness. The result was tangible and transformative: the funding of hundreds of homes for the homeless. This stable housing, in turn, became the foundation for a new beginning, allowing over a thousand individuals to transition out of homelessness and return to productive, working lives.
Analysis
Phase I validated the operational approach. Standard controls applied to a disorganized business produced stable profitability. That profitability funded social programs, including housing construction. Process discipline generated both the margin and the capacity to allocate it.
The Lesson
Having forged the doctrine in the volatility of dispensary operations, I exited the industry and transitioned to a strategic advisory role.
Applied the same operational methodology to strategic problems at technology companies.
Case Study #2
Huawei Consumer: Pre-US Mobile Revenue to Android Adoption
Market Context
Following the iPhone's 2007 launch, the mobile industry was restructuring around software ecosystems. Huawei had no US mobile revenue.
Apple had established a paradigm of total control: a vertically integrated ecosystem where it designed the hardware, the software (iOS), and the marketplace (the App Store).
or every other hardware manufacturer, from giants like Samsung to a then-unknown Chinese telecom company named Huawei, the strategic question was monumental: how do you compete with a closed, perfect system?
Building a proprietary OS from scratch to rival iOS was a near-impossible task, requiring billions in R&D and years to build a comparable app ecosystem. Into this environment, Google introduced Android, a robust, open-source platform that it offered to manufacturers for free. This created a clear strategic fork in the road: take the high-risk, high-cost path of proprietary innovation, or the reliable, ecosystem-ready path of adoption.
The Challenge
Introducing Consumer Software Expertise Into An Established Hardware Brand
Huawei, a global leader in telecommunications infrastructure, possessed world-class hardware engineering but lacked consumer software DNA. Their initial attempts at a smartphone, running a clunky, proprietary OS, were functionally unusable and dead on arrival in a market increasingly defined by user experience.
Purpose
Advise a pre-US-revenue hardware OEM on path to consumer market in a software-driven market.
Service
To Huawei's leadership, providing a clear-eyed assessment of the build vs. adopt dilemma.
Execution
Advocated for adopting Android over developing a proprietary OS. This allowed Huawei to focus on hardware, reduce market-entry risk, and access an existing app ecosystem.This decision would allow Huawei to:
Focus on Core Competency: Concentrate on what it did best: designing and manufacturing world-class hardware.
De-Risk Market Entry: Eliminate the immense financial and temporal risks of building a software ecosystem from zero.
Instantly Access an Ecosystem: Tap directly into Google’s rapidly growing Android Market, giving its users immediate access to thousands of apps.
Results
The decision to adopt Android was a foundational pillar of Huawei’s strategy. It enabled them to compete directly with other global players and transform from a niche hardware maker into one of the largest smartphone manufacturers in the world.
The pattern set in motion by seemingly small decisions at the earliest stages of development proved impactful.
Case Study #3
Ploom: Pre-Revenue to Platform Shift
Market Context
The early e-cigarette market was a graveyard of unsatisfying products. E-cigarettes like British Tobacco’s Blu mimicked the look of cigarettes but failed to deliver a consistent or effective nicotine experience due to poor technology and the choice of nicotine used, which was harsh at high temperatures.
In parallel, a niche market for cannabis vaporization was solving a similar, but more high-stakes problem: how to precisely heat valuable botanical material without burning it. It was in this niche space that real innovation was happening.
The Challenge
Introducing Consumer Software Expertise Into An Established Hardware Brand
A novel nicotine company born at Stanford Product Design Master's Program, Ploom was failing to gain traction with its butane-powered device. It was unreliable and carried the negative cultural association of a lighter. Recognizing the need for a fundamental shift, Ploom engaged me with a specific mission: bring the technology of the other industries to the nicotine market to solve the core channel limitations.
Purpose
To expand the company's TAM.
Service
To the end-user, by providing a clean, consistent, and satisfying experience superior to anything on the market.
Execution
The Foundational Platform Shift. Brubeck led the critical design change away from nicotine. This was the core inspiration imported from an oblique market. This seemingly simple pivot was, in fact, a platform shift that unlocked the entire future of the company:
From Butane to Electric: This change delivered precise temperature control, eliminated the harshness of combustion, and provided a consistent experience with every use. This new platform became the PAX Model One, a best-in-class device for vaporization.
From Platform to Product: The evolution of this path led to applying this reliable electric heating platform to a new medium. By combining it with the chemical innovation of nicotine salts (which deliver a more potent, less harsh nicotine experience) and the engineering innovation of miniaturizing it into a self-contained pod, the JUUL was born.
Results
The JUUL created an entirely new product category. The company, built on this foundational strategic expansion, achieving a staggering $37 billion valuation within three years.
Case Study #4
Cromogen: Pharmaceutical-Grade Botanical API Development
Market Context
The botanical supplement industry operated under state-level regulations with limited scientific validation. The pharmaceutical industry required isolated, purified compounds through FDA clinical trials. Cromogen developed a third approach: broad-spectrum botanical ingredients manufactured to pharmaceutical-grade standards.
The Challenge
Bridging Botanical and Pharmaceutical Standards with Federal Licensure
I identified a gap between these two extremes and founded Cromogen.
The venture was built on a hypothesis: that the therapeutic efficacy of cannabis lay not in a single isolated molecule, but in the complex, synergistic interplay of its many compounds (often called the "entourage effect").
Purpose
Create broad-spectrum botanical ingredients that met pharmaceutical purity, consistency, and quality requirements.
Service
The client was Pfizer's Global Procurement Organization (GPO), which maintains strict vendor qualification requirements.
Execution
Built a company operating across botany and biotechnology. Scaled the team from 3 to 45 in six months. I left the company to its cofounders when research and compliance was no longer a focus.
Results
Cromogen and Nevada Laboratories produced a broad-spectrum botanical API adopted as a standard ingredient by pharmaceutical companies. The team and facility scaled to meet production requirements.
Brubeck left the company in January 2020 to legacy cofounders to open European manufacturing independently.
Case Study #5
Olive UK: Rapid-Onset Oral Delivery Platform
Introduction
Olive UK applied operational, design, and regulatory principles from prior work to a new oral delivery technology.
Market Context
The landscape Olive entered was one JUUL had helped create. Vaping had exploded, solving the immediacy and ritual problem for smokers. However, this success created a new set of challenges:
The Health Concern: A growing public and regulatory backlash was forming around the long-term health effects of inhalation and vaping.
The Social Stigma: The act of vaping, while more acceptable than smoking, still carried a social stigma and was prohibited in many public and private spaces.
The Unsolved Problem: The core issue from Phase I, unpredictable and slow onset for edible products, remained largely unsolved for the mass market.
The strategic opportunity was clear: to deliver the rapid, predictable experience that modern consumers demanded, but in a new form factor that was healthier, more discreet, and socially acceptable. The challenge was to decouple the desired effect from the act of inhalation.
Purpose
Develop a reliable, rapid-acting oral delivery platform with predictable dosing and consumer-grade safety.
Service
To the modern consumer who demands immediate and predictable results without the health risks and social friction of inhalation. And, for the first time explicitly, to a mature shareholder base demanding a defensible, scalable, and highly valuable enterprise.
Execution
The product used pharmacokinetic design validated by clinical data to deliver rapid onset via an oral bead. Manufactured under cGMP standards for dose consistency. Designed for regulatory defensibility and scalable production.
Work together
We start with a short phone call to get to know each other. From there, we tailor a solution that's best for you
1
Book a Call
I develop an efficiency protocol and refine it based on your feedback.
1
Book a Call
I develop an efficiency protocol and refine it based on your feedback.
1
Book a Call
I develop an efficiency protocol and refine it based on your feedback.
2
Project Brief
Once we’re on the same page, we’ll define the project scope, timeline, and deliverables. A structured brief ensures a smooth and efficient process
2
Project Brief
Once we’re on the same page, we’ll define the project scope, timeline, and deliverables. A structured brief ensures a smooth and efficient process
2
Project Brief
Once we’re on the same page, we’ll define the project scope, timeline, and deliverables. A structured brief ensures a smooth and efficient process
3
Execution
I develop an efficiency protocol and refine it based on your feedback.
3
Execution
I develop an efficiency protocol and refine it based on your feedback.
3
Execution
I develop an efficiency protocol and refine it based on your feedback.
4
Delivery
Deliver the final protocol. Review structure, timetable, and open questions with your team.
4
Delivery
Deliver the final protocol. Review structure, timetable, and open questions with your team.
4
Delivery
Deliver the final protocol. Review structure, timetable, and open questions with your team.
5
Support
If you're in need of ongoing support, we can discuss retainer options to include me on your team for updates and accountability.
5
Support
If you're in need of ongoing support, we can discuss retainer options to include me on your team for updates and accountability.
5
Support
If you're in need of ongoing support, we can discuss retainer options to include me on your team for updates and accountability.
Michael Brubeck
Process Consultant
Michael Brubeck
Process Consultant
Michael Brubeck
Process Consultant
Let's connect
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The method was replicable. Applied across fourteen units, producing a predictable profit stream.
© 2025 All rights reserved
© 2025 All rights reserved
© 2025 All rights reserved