Honest AI help for Taylor small businesses.

You've probably been pitched already.

If you run a business in Taylor, somebody has likely already emailed you promising that AI will change everything. Most of them have never set foot here. I live here. You'll run into me downtown, at a Taylor Duck Nation football game, or at Old Taylor High like anybody else.

I'm John Bongaarts, and Chiptown Consulting is just me — a neighbor who spent a career in technology, helping Taylor's shops, trades, clinics, and restaurants make sense of what's actually useful.

On all the change in town.

Samsung, the data centers, the construction, the headlines — Taylor is changing fast, and not everyone's happy about it. Reasonable neighbors disagree, and I'm not here to sell you on the boom or argue against it.

But the technology driving all of it is coming either way, and it shouldn't only pay off for the companies pouring the concrete. If AI is going to change how business gets done around here, Taylor's own businesses deserve the good part of that deal — on your terms, at your pace, with a neighbor in your corner. My job is helping the change work for you, not just happen to you.

What working with me looks like.

We start with coffee — no slides, no pitch. You tell me how your business actually runs: where the day goes, what eats your time, what you wish you didn't have to think about.

Then I give you straight answers about three things: what's possible, what's cost-effective, and what could give you back time and profit margin right now. Sometimes that's an AI tool. Sometimes it's a thirty-dollar fix for something you're doing by hand. Sometimes it's "you're fine — don't buy anything."

If it looks like there's something worth doing, the next step is a working session — half a day or a full day, hands-on with your actual work. Never touched an AI tool? That's fine; most folks haven't. I'll show you what's possible, set up the basics with you, and get you started on the right foot so you can run it yourself. And if you want ongoing help down the road, I'm right here in town.

The honest part.

The only thing I'm selling is straight advice — so I have no reason to talk you into anything. If AI isn't what your business needs, I'll say so, and you're out nothing but an hour. The coffee was on me anyway.

A bit about me.

Before Chiptown, I spent seventeen years at National Instruments in Austin, building test systems for semiconductor makers. When NI was acquired by Emerson Electric, I stayed on to lead AI strategy across the Fortune 500 company — including taking one of its first generative AI products to market. I've seen what this technology genuinely does well, and where the hype outruns reality. That's exactly why I won't oversell it to you.

Around town, Chiptown is a proud sponsor of Taylor Duck Nation — my daughter cheers on those sidelines.

If you're curious how I think, I write about AI and the economy — including how it all looks from here in Taylor — at Artificial Economics.

What clients say.

"John stepped in and created the structure we needed — clear deliverables, dependencies, owners. He mobilized the team and shipped. Revenue came back. Simple as that."