Why Your Toughest Parts Still Use 50-Year-Old Materials w/ Fazal Mahmood
Fazal Mahmood, co-founder and CEO of Phase Shift Technologies, explains how AI is accelerating the discovery of new metal alloys to replace 50-year-old materials in industries like oil and gas, aerospace, and defense. He details the critical gap between designing a material and qualifying it for regulated markets, noting that legacy producers often lack the incentive to innovate outside their core franchises. Mahmood highlights three key drivers for this shift: the maturation of additive manufacturing, the performance limits of existing materials in technologies like nuclear fusion, and supply chain disruptions in critical raw materials like tungsten. He illustrates these points with a specific example of a new printable tungsten carbide alloy designed for laser powder bed fusion to solve wear resistance issues in complex flow components.