BUILD YOUR AGENDA

Explore innovations in machining, additive, automation, digital solutions, quality and more.

See a live, end-to-end manufacturing system operating continuously on the show floor.

Your front-row seat to the people shaping the industry.

Have a particular manufacturing challenge? Have a seat and discover solutions.

An overview of the evolution of ISO 10303 STEP standards and their role in enabling Model-Based Enterprise. 
Related standards such as JT, QIF, IFC, and PRC are also discussed, highlighting their specific applications in industries like automotive, inspection, architecture, and 3D document sharing.
 

The Accountability Problem

An AI-informed scheduling adjustment triggers a tool changeover that contributes to a quality escape. The defect reaches a customer. Who signs the CAPA—the algorithm, the operator who accepted the recommendation, or the plant manager who approved the system?

Until manufacturers can answer that question without hesitation, AI adoption on the factory floor will remain slowed by legitimate governance and compliance concerns.

Bounded AI: A Governance-First Design Approach

This session addresses the accountability challenge directly by introducing bounded AI—a design approach in which AI systems operate within explicitly defined authority, preserve full traceability, surface uncertainty, and support safe rollback. Rather than granting algorithms unchecked autonomy, bounded AI integrates decision support into existing operational workflows while maintaining clear lines of responsibility.

The discussion is grounded in real manufacturing environments: mixed-vintage equipment, established PLC logic, MES systems, regulated quality processes, and audit requirements. Through practical factory-floor scenarios, attendees will see how bounded AI integrates with existing governance structures such as change control, CAPA workflows, and audit trails—without disrupting throughput or safety.

What Attendees Will See

Specifically, the session demonstrates how to:

Define documented decision boundaries for AI recommendations
Surface system confidence levels to support informed operator judgment
Maintain continuous traceability of AI-influenced decisions
Implement structured rollback mechanisms to protect production stability
Extend existing change control processes to AI-driven adjustments

Operational Impact

When accountability is engineered intentionally, manufacturers reduce resistance to AI adoption, accelerate decision cycles, improve schedule responsiveness, and strengthen audit readiness. Plants can introduce AI-assisted scheduling, maintenance prioritization, and process optimization within 1–3 years—without controller replacement or forklift system upgrades.

Workforce Stability

Equally important, this session addresses workforce stability. AI systems that override human authority create distrust and compliance risk. AI systems that preserve operator judgment, document decision rationale, and clarify accountability elevate human roles instead of diminishing them. In bounded AI architectures, operators remain the accountable decision-makers—equipped with better information, not replaced by automation.

Key Takeaway

Attendees will leave with a practical governance framework for deploying AI in both regulated and non-regulated manufacturing environments—improving uptime, quality performance, and operational responsiveness without introducing accountability gaps or workforce disruption.

Educational Outcomes / Lessons Learned

Attendees will learn:

Why accountability ambiguity is a primary barrier to AI adoption in manufacturing
How to define and document AI decision boundaries
How to integrate explainability and traceability into existing quality systems
How rollback architecture reduces deployment risk
How bounded AI strengthens workforce trust and regulatory confidence

At IMTS, every shop asks: what should we invest in next? This roundtable brings together Verdant Commercial Capital, CLA, and MakingChips for a candid conversation on evaluating and financing growth—plus a practical framework to help you decide what purchase actually makes sense.

Explore innovations in machining, additive, automation, digital solutions, quality and more.

See a live, end-to-end manufacturing system operating continuously on the show floor.

Your front-row seat to the people shaping the industry.

Have a particular manufacturing challenge? Have a seat and discover solutions.

Automated Non-Contact EMAT Thickness Measurement for Aerospace Metals in CNC Milling

Four companies actually putting robots to work in production automation, robotic sheet metal forming, and AI-powered welding. Less about what's possible in a lab, more about what's running in real factories today: the integration headaches, the customer economics, and what it takes to scale from one cell to one hundred.

Reshoring is the most common theme and these new manufacturers are building factories at a pace the legacy base hasn't matched in decades. Four of the most-watched names in manufacturing on what reindustrialization actually requires capacity, capital, and contracts. 

Manufacturing isn't simply evolving—it's being reinvented. Advances in robotics, additive manufacturing, AI, and digital workflows are fundamentally changing how products are designed, produced, and delivered. In this workshop, Haddy COO, Lex Kiefhaber explores the shift from centralized factories to regional microfactories—where products are manufactured closer to demand, lead times shrink from months to days, and digital inventories replace physical ones. Through real-world case studies across furniture, hospitality, defense, and construction, attendees will gain a practical understanding of how this technology are reshaping manufacturing.

Explore innovations in machining, additive, automation, digital solutions, quality and more.

See a live, end-to-end manufacturing system operating continuously on the show floor.

Your front-row seat to the people shaping the industry.

Have a particular manufacturing challenge? Have a seat and discover solutions.

Lace up and run to fund STEM education.

Every manufacturer sits on valuable data locked inside ERP and back office systems, out of reach of the frontline workers who need it most. This session tells the story of Riddell, a company that has designed football protective equipment for nearly a century, and how it put that data directly into its frontline sellers' hands. Facing a field sales team that spent too much of the day hunting for pricing, delivery dates, and order status across disconnected systems, Riddell chose not to add more support staff. Instead it built an AI assistant, called RIA, that connects to its SAP ERP and answers natural language questions inside Microsoft Teams, in the flow of a rep's day. Attendees will learn how Riddell scoped the solution around a day in the life study of its frontline roles, prepared and governed its ERP data for AI, and drove adoption through a phased rollout and disciplined change management. We will share the measurable results, including more than 21,000 hours returned to the team each year, and show why the same pattern of frontline enablement applies just as well to operators, maintenance, and field service across the plant and beyond.

Program closing remarks. 

Join the leaders featured in the IMTS+ Original Series The Architect as they discuss theideas, technologies, and partnerships shaping the future of manufacturing.

Physical AI for industry still faces many operational challenges even as consumer-facing tools explode in popularity and capability. Professor Jay Lee draws on decades of artificial intelligence experience to outline new opportunities and pitfalls for manufacturers.

Explore innovations in machining, additive, automation, digital solutions, quality and more.

See a live, end-to-end manufacturing system operating continuously on the show floor.

Your front-row seat to the people shaping the industry.

Have a particular manufacturing challenge? Have a seat and discover solutions.

What should this part cost today? Which of last month's supplier price increases were actually justified? And where would re-sourcing beat renegotiating?
Most procurement teams can answer these questions for their top parts, once a year, in a spreadsheet. Across 400+ industrial manufacturers, we see what changes when they can answer for every part, every day: savings potential worth 10%+ of material cost becomes visible, and capturable. In a market where tariff rules change mid-quarter, freight swings double digits, and reshoring forces supplier requalifications, that speed is moving margin and market share from slow manufacturers to fast ones.
This 30-minute session shows how the fast ones do it. Real screens, real parts, real numbers. Here's how it plays out:

AI finds every part's fair cost. Cost models built from material, process, freight, and duties show what each part should cost today. The gap to the price you pay is your savings potential, mapped across 100,000+ parts, not just the A-parts.
Every negotiation runs on it. Some increases are justified; many aren't. The analysis becomes arguments, counterpoints, and target prices. You walk in prepared and run it on your terms.
AI points sourcing where the money is. Sometimes the bigger lever is a new supplier. You see which parts are worth re-quoting and the price to beat.

For procurement, purchasing, supply chain, and plant leaders, anyone who owns a margin number. Then see your own potential: Tacto, Booth 135711 - live demo plus a free savings snapshot from your own order data. Ten concrete opportunities, no IT project required.

Session Type: Technical Case Study with Live Demonstration

Level: Intermediate to Advanced

Duration: 45-60 minutes (including Q&A)

What You'll Learn:

How to connect industrial equipment to modern AI chat agents using standard protocols

Best practices for creating machine-specific knowledge bases that LLMs can reliably query

Practical strategies to prevent AI hallucinations when dealing with technical manufacturing data

Real-world implementation challenges and solutions from a production environment

A repeatable framework for making your machines "conversational"

Who Should Attend:

Manufacturing engineers, automation specialists, plant managers, and technical leaders exploring AI

applications for production environments. Basic familiarity with ChatGPT or Claude is helpful but not

required.

Key Takeaway:

By the end of this session, you'll understand how to architect an AI conversation layer for your manufacturing equipment—transforming complex machine data into accessible insights through natural language interaction.

AMDT research shows a persistent “reality gap” inside industrial organizations: executives are highly confident in their OT security and stability, while the teams closest to the equipment see frequent disruptions, human error, and growing cyber exposure. This session helps manufacturers close that gap by combining data from US plants with a practical playbook for unifying leadership, engineering, and OT around a single source of truth for configurations, changes, and incidents. 

Close out the day with IMTS Unwind on the IMTS+ Main Stage! Each episode features lively interviews with industry experts, main-stage keynote speakers, manufacturers, and social media influencers. Get the scoop on must-see events for the next day and key insights to make the most of your IMTS.

Explore innovations in machining, additive, automation, digital solutions, quality and more.

See a live, end-to-end manufacturing system operating continuously on the show floor.

Your front-row seat to the people shaping the industry.

Have a particular manufacturing challenge? Have a seat and discover solutions.

Join Boom Supersonic’s Chief Scientist Nick Sheryka and Head of Manufacturing Nate Hepler for a dynamic 30-minute fireside chat moderated by AMT VP - Technology, Ryan Kelly. Discover how Boom is defying traditional aerospace timelines by bringing full-lifecycle manufacturing under one roof in Denver—vertically integrating advanced turbomachinery to power both Mach 1.7 commercial flight and next-generation energy infrastructure for AI data centers.

IMTS showcases what is possible across automation, artificial intelligence, robotics, digital manufacturing, and other advanced technologies—but turning inspiration into action can be challenging. Sarah Hartwick of the Illinois Manufacturers’ Association and Dan Hofmann of the Illinois Manufacturing Excellence Center will discuss how manufacturers can evaluate emerging opportunities, prepare their workforce, access available resources, and make informed investments. The conversation will highlight the strength of Illinois’ manufacturing ecosystem and how industry, government, education, and workforce partners can help companies move from curiosity to implementation.

When the machine checks out fine but the scrap bin keeps filling up: the real culprits behind blown parts.

The US manufacturing base needs faster access to advanced technology to compete globally. Dean Banks joins AMT's Ryan Kelly for a conversation on what that takes — policy, talent, and industrial strategy working together — and a candid look at where American manufacturing stands today.

Explore innovations in machining, additive, automation, digital solutions, quality and more.

See a live, end-to-end manufacturing system operating continuously on the show floor.

Your front-row seat to the people shaping the industry.

Have a particular manufacturing challenge? Have a seat and discover solutions.

Discover the ideas and innovations transforming manufacturing. This Main Stage session will feature industry experts sharing insights on emerging technologies, workforce trends, and the future of the industry.

Kickstart your day with the IMTS Morning Show on the IMTS+ Main Stage! Each episode features lively interviews with industry experts, main-stage keynote speakers, manufacturers, and social media influencers. Get the scoop on must-see events and key insights to make the most of your day at IMTS.

Discover the ideas and innovations transforming manufacturing. This Main Stage session will feature industry experts sharing insights on emerging technologies, workforce trends, and the future of the industry.