ARM Institute Convenes its Member Ecosystem for 8th Annual Member Meeting

The ARM Institute’s 2024 Member Meeting took place Sept. 23-25 in Pittsburgh, PA, convening subject matter experts from across industry, government, and academia.

The ARM Institute recently hosted its 8th Annual Member Meeting, which took place Sept. 23-25 in Pittsburgh, PA. The members-only event convened around 350 individual subject matter experts from across the ARM Institute’s 400+ member organization consortium. These experts represented organizations spanning industry, government, and academia with focus areas in robotics, artificial intelligence (AI), education/workforce development, and manufacturing. The ARM Institute’s Member Meeting uniquely facilitates collaboration between competitors and non-traditional collaborators for the shared mission of strengthening U.S. manufacturing.

Read on to explore learnings, outputs, and highlights from our 2024 Member Meeting! Note that ARM Members will have access to most presentations and recordings from our event through the ARM Member Community later this fall.

Knowledge-Sharing

Keynote Presentations by Subject Matter Experts

We were honored to welcome several experts as keynote speakers during our meeting:

Dr. Charles Ormsby, Division Chief for Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) Manufacturing, Industrial Technologies, and Energy Division, outlined areas of need, technology innovations and strategic focus areas for the Department of Defense. Dr. Orsmby also asked the ARM Membership for feedback into new initiatives he was considering to strengthen the Defense Industrial Base.
Alex Shikany, Vice President, Membership & Market Intelligence at ARM Member A3, again joined us to present an overview of trends impacting the North American robotics market. While the robotics industry is returning to more normal levels following the jump we saw from the Covid-19 pandemic, Alex is bullish on the longe-term view and pointed out emerging markets that included hospitals, agriculture, construction, and textiles. Alex also reminded ARM Members about upcoming A3 events, including Automate 202 5 taking place May 12-15 in Detroit.
Dr. Paul D. Nielsen, Director and Chief Executive Officer of Carnegie Mellon University’s Software Engineering Institute (SEI), presented a keynote discussion on Hope and Hype – AI and Autonomy. He outlined not only the work that CMU SEI is doing to address AI for smart manufacturing, but also areas that he has seen have a tangible effect on manufacturing.
Dr. Brad Conrad, Education and Workforce Development Manager within the Partnerships and Outreach Division at the NIST Office of Advanced Manufacturing, presented a keynote presentation during our Education/Workforce Development (EWD) track exploring Longitudinal Tracking of Workforce Development Programs. This work centered on how NIST is partnering with key organizations, including the ARM Institute and the U.S. Census Bureau, to understand what gaps exist for workers and how to better connect workers to supporting resources.

Department of Defense Office of Strategic Capital

We were honored to welcome the Department of Defense Office of Strategic Capital (OSC) to our Member Meeting. The DoD OSC was established to (1) attract private capital to national security priorities and (2) scale investment in critical technologies. Representatives from OSC were available in our Member Showcase Hall to connect with ARM Members. OSC also hosted a roundtable discussion break-out that enable ARM Members to help shape OSC’s programs and products to be of best use to companies.

The ARM Institute’s Strategic Focus Areas

Livia Rice, ARM Institute Director of Outreach & Engagement, emcees the Annual Member Meeting

ARM Institute-led knowledge-sharing sessions centered on helping Members understand our strategic direction and ways they could get even more involved in ARM Institute initiatives. Ira Moskowitz, ARM Institute CEO, set the stage with a recap of the past year during his welcome address. The next day, Ira outlined the strategic direction of the ARM Institute with Chuck Brandt (ARM Institute Chief Technology Officer) illustrating how the ARM Institute’s tech focus areas tie into the overall Institute strategy, Lisa Masciantonio (ARM Institute Chief Workforce Officer) outlining how the EWD programs support the institute’s strategy, and Jay Douglass (ARM Institute Chief Operating Officer) summarizing how our member acquisition and retention strategy supports all of this work.

An Emphasis on AI for Robotics in Manufacturing

Our team dove deeper into key strategic programs with Michael Skocik leading a session on our work to make AI more accessible for robotics in manufacturing. This work centers on three key areas: (1) the Institute’s efforts occurring under the working title AI Data Foundry, which seeks to make manufacturing datasets and software tools for deploying AI more accessible (2) the ARM Institute’s collaboration with CMU’s Manufacturing Futures Institute and ARM Member Catalyst Connection to build learning capabilities for AI and robots into the institute’s shared Pittsburgh headquarters (3) the institute’s work to identify and define the skills needed to work with AI for robotics in manufacturing and create a competency framework to support these skills with Members, as the Institute did for robotics roles.

The Member Meeting provided a key platform for ARM Members to start working with the ARM Institute on these new AI programs with sessions centered on a new Tech Project Call supporting the AI Data Foundry, which will be released in its final format in the coming weeks, and the EWD team hosting an interactive session around AI skills definition during the EWD track.

Key Technology Areas of Focus, including Apparel Manufacturing

Cara Cranston, ARM Institute Director of Technology Programs, provided greater insight into the ARM Institute’s increasing focus on robotics for apparel manufacturing. Over the past several years, the ARM Institute has funded and managed high-impact projects that have greatly furthered the state-of-the-art for robotics in apparel manufacturing and sewing. Cara outlined how the ARM Institute is building on this foundation. Stay tuned for more updates about this effort.

Employer Resources Coming to RoboticsCareer.org

Usage of RoboticsCareer.org has been steadily increasing since the capability’s launch. With a critical mass of registered users leveraging the site to connect to jobs and internships, as well as training, John Zappa (ARM Institute Director of Product Management) outlined new features for hiring employers that are coming soon on RoboticsCareer.org. These features will enable HR representatives, hiring managers, and hiring organizers to more easily search through the talent database on RoboticsCareer.org to connect to qualified individuals. Stay tuned for more information about this forthcoming release.

Networking

Our 2024 event featured even greater networking time – enabling our Members to connect with organizations they may not be aware of or they otherwise may be unable to partner with outside of the ARM Institute’s ecosystem. This networking time took the form of several networking receptions, including several hours on the opening night of our event, during meals and breaks, and at a networking reception at our Pittsburgh facility.

Additionally, Members got hands-on with technology solutions being demonstrated in the Member Showcase Hall. Several organizations opted to purchase table space in the Member Showcase Hall, including: Amarel-US, Apex Accelerator, Concurrent EDA, Corsha, DoD Office of Strategic Capital, Fanuc, HaptX, Medema Labs, NEFF, Premier Automation, ProcureStack, Schmersal, SharpCloud, Titan Robotics, Universal Robots, and GridRaster.

As always, our five-minute member rapid introductions continued to be a popular highlight of our event. In these sessions, Members who secured an introduction slot (which were opened on a first come, first served basis during the registration process and prioritized organizations that had not yet presented a pitch either during a prior Member Meeting or during one of our virtual New Member Exchanges) were able to provide a five-minute introduction to their organization’s capabilities and interests. Members were strictly timed with music playing at the end of their pitch. The following organizations provided five-minute introductions at this year’s event:

Collaboration

The ARM Institute’s work doesn’t happen on its own; our membership is foundational to our success. The Member Meeting again provided opportunities for Members to collaborate and provide input into our work. Below are just a few ways we enabled collaboration during our meeting.

Project Calls

ARM Institute Project Calls remain an integral tool the institute leverages to address critical areas of need in manufacturing. During our meeting, we referred to two new Project Calls and hosted activities to help members prepare competitive responses to these Project Calls.

AIDF Project Call: In the weeks leading up to our Member Meeting, we issued a Draft Version of a Tech Project Call supporting our AI Data Foundry program. Members learned more about this Project Call during our Tech Concurrent Session and had the opportunity to ask questions, connect with potential team members, and meet 1:1 with our tech team to get feedback on their project ideas. This Project Call is currently available only to ARM Members on the Member Community, and will be released publicly on or about November 15 as we work to incorporate member feedback we received during the Member Meeting into the final version of our Project Call. Stay tuned to this page to learn when the Project Call is publicly released.
Education & Workforce Development Endorsement Project Call: We also hosted a panel discussion featuring representatives from a few of our ARM Endorsed training programs to help members understand the value of ARM Endorsement. With more than 16,000 training programs listed on RoboticsCareer.org, ARM Endorsement provides much needed guidance for students and workers by recognizing the nation’s most effective training programs. Following the Member Meeting, we released our new Education & Workforce Development (EWD) Project Call that enables Members to apply to undergo the ARM Endorsement evaluation at no-cost. Learn more about this Project Call here. While this Project Call is publicly available, an organization must be an ARM Member to apply. Proposals are due on Nov. 25.

AI Competency Framework Activity

As AI continues to impact manufacturing, workers and students will need new skills to work with AI. Likewise, educators and training programs need to know what skills they will need to teach to prepare their students for these new opportunities. The ARM Institute is embarking on a focused effort to define the skills and competencies needed to work with AI in robotics for manufacturing, just as the institute defined the skills needed for robotics careers in manufacturing at large. The Member Meeting provided a key first step in the creation of an AI competency framework. The entire EWD concurrent track on the final day of our event served as an interactive activity to get input on these skills from our Members.

The ARM Institute is working on understanding the learnings from this first activity and will host a series of workshops to further refine and define these skills in the coming months and into the early parts of 2025. As with our robotics career pathways, the outputs from this work will feed directly into RoboticsCareer.org and help to connect students and workers to AI training and job opportunities in robotics for manufacturing.

Casting & Forging Interactive Activity

Robotics for casting and forging has become a key area of focus for our tech team with the ARM Institute having hosted several workshops to feed into the creation of a Robotics for Casting & Forging Roadmap. During the Member Meeting, we continued to solicit member input into our learnings through an interactive activity during our technology concurrent session. Through this activity, attendees learned about the themes we identified in the casting and forging workshops and provided input into how these themes are affecting their own operations.

Indoor/Outdoor Networking Reception

For our reception on the second night, ARM Members made the short trip to our Pittsburgh headquarters that we share with Carnegie Mellon University’s Manufacturing Futures Institute (MFI) in the Hazelwood neighborhood. During this indoor/outdoor networking reception, Members had the opportunity to explore robotics demonstrations in our Robotics Manufacturing Hub and learned how this free program is helping small and medium-sized manufacturers de-risk, test, and prototype robotics at no-cost. This reception also provided additional networking time accompanied by dinner and drinks.

Celebrating Our 2024 Class of ARM Champions

The ARM Champion awards recognize ARM Member who have gone above and beyond the call of membership to further our mission and strengthen U.S. manufacturing. We were honored to present the following individual members with Champion Awards this year:

Neil Ashbaugh, New Century Careers
Gregorio Balandran, Amcor
Xu Chen, University of Washington
Lisa Fronczek, NIST
Frank Henderson, Henderson Sewing
Stuart Lawrence, Titan Robotics
Scott Lucas, WSU Tech
Matt Minner, Catalyst Connection
Dijam Panigrahi, GridRaster
John Wen, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

On the Horizon

Collaboration and member engagement doesn’t stop after our Annual Member Meeting! Beyond the Project Calls outlined above, below are just a few things on horizon for the ARM Institute:

Updates Coming to the ARM Member Community

ARM Members were reminded during our event about the many capabilities available to them through the digital ARM Member Community. Through the Community, Members can search for each other, send messages, access member-exclusive research, explore member-exclusive project updates and outputs, share news, and join groups, such as our group that shares external funding opportunities and our group that shares updates about our AI Data Foundry program. Suzy Teele, ARM Institute Chief Strategy Officer, also announced that the ARM team would be revamping parts of the Member Community using member feedback to make the platform easier to use and navigate.

Robotic Welding Workshop for Manufacturers

In support of the ARM Institute’s Robotics Manufacturing Hub program for small and medium-sized manufacturers in the Southwestern Pennsylvania region, the ARM Institute will host a Robotic Welding Workshop for Manufacturers at its Pittsburgh headquarters on November 21. ARM Members were encouraged to submit speaking abstracts and interest in hosting an information table during this event.

Registration for this event is now open! This event is free to attend, but advanced registration is required. Breakfast and lunch will be provided for in-person attendees. There are two options for participation:

In-Person Participation: Individuals in the Pittsburgh region are invited to join us in-person for our event, which will take place at our Pittsburgh headquarters (4501 Lytle St. Pittsburgh, PA 15207). We have limited in-person spots available. Register to attend in-person here.
Virtual Participation: Individuals outside of the region are also invited to join us virtually! Virtual attendees will be able to join a live-streamed version of our event where they will attend our presentations, be able to ask questions, and will have access to recordings of our robotics demonstrations. Register to attend virtually here.

Feel welcome to share the registration information with interested manufacturers. Additionally, the ARM Institute open applications for its second cohort of manufacturers for our Robotics Manufacturing Hub program. Manufacturers in the Southwestern Pennsylvania region can learn more here and apply by November 22.

Member Priorities Survey

Within the coming months, the ARM Institute will issue its annual Member Priorities Survey, which will be sent to every member. The results of this annual survey are used to inform ARM Institute priorities, services, benefits, and initiatives. Stay tuned to your email to respond. Members can also access the findings and recommendations from our 2024 Annual Member survey on the Member Community.

Thank You to Our Sponsors

As always, the ARM Institute thanks our Platinum Members and Member Meeting sponsors for supporting this important event and, by doing so, helping to strengthen U.S. manufacturing: GE Vernova, Siemens, AMT – the Association for Manufacturing Technology, CarnegieBosch Institute, Corsha, Fivestar, GridRaster, Mason & Hanger, NC3 – National Coalition of Certification Centers, Titan Robotics, Universal Robots, and Yaskawa.

Platinum Members

Member Meeting Sponsors

Save the Date: 2025 Annual ARM Institute Member Meeting

Our 2025 Annual Member Meeting will take place Sept. 3-5 in Pittsburgh, PA! This event is open only to ARM Members. Learn more about membership here or email us at [email protected] to join in time to attend.

Explore More Photos from Our Event in the Flickr Library Below:

ABOUT THE ARM INSTITUTE

The ARM (Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing) Institute is a Manufacturing Innovation Institute (MII) funded by the Office of the Secretary of Defense under Agreement Number W911NF-17-3-0004 and is part of the Manufacturing USA® network. The ARM Institute leverages a unique, robust, and diverse ecosystem of over 400 consortium members and partners across industry, academia, and government to make robotics, autonomy, and artificial intelligence more accessible to U.S. manufacturers large and small, train and empower the manufacturing workforce, strengthen our economy and global competitiveness, and elevate national security and resilience. Based in Pittsburgh, PA since 2017, with a regional office in St. Petersburg, FL, the ARM Institute is leading the way to a future where people and robots work together to respond to our nation’s greatest challenges and to produce the world’s most desired products. For more information, visit www.arminstitute.org and follow the ARM Institute on LinkedIn and X(Twitter).

2024 Member Meeting Recap