AUTOMATE
DISCOVERS A
NEW SOUL
It’s goodbye Chicago as the North America’s largest automation show is moving to Detroit for 2021. Automate 2019 was keenly anticipated and the show didn’t disappoint. RoboPro Magazine was there and below Neil Martin features some of the news which came out of the exhibition.
The announcement that the move to Motown was being planned came on the first day of Automate 2019 and caused a ripple of excitement amongst the attendees. The next event will now take place at the Cobo Center, on 1720 May, 2021. So make a space in your diaries. The reason for the move is the size of Automate - it has grown to more than 500 exhibitors, over 20,000 attendees and 1,000 paid conference registrants - and the fact that the show has come of age and does not now need to colocate with other events. Automate has grown and now needs a location to reflect its growing statue within industry. “To continue our rapid growth, and better meet the needs of our exhibitors who look to Automate to reach new potential customers, we’ve decided that now is the right time to move Automate to its own location – and Detroit is an ideal fit,” said Jeff Burnstein, president of the Association for Advancing Automation (A3), the show’s organizer. “Detroit is turning into the next major technology hub in the United States. This is an exciting change for us and our exhibitors, allowing Automate to expand in size and technology scope as the automation industry continues its steady growth.”
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DETROIT I’ve never been been to Detroit - it’s one of those US cities I’ve missed for some reason - so it was handy of the Automate organisers to point out that it was named one of Lonely Planet’s top cities to visit in 2018. What’s more, studies from the Brookings Institution have rated Detroit number four on a list of the country’s hubs for advanced technology employment, with nearly 15% of the workforce in the Detroit-Warren-Dearborn area working in areas such as research and development and engineering. Though known as a traditional automotive hub, the region is growing in other industries such as aerospace, logistics and advanced mobility. “We’re very excited that Automate will be moving to Detroit in 2021,” said Mike Cicco, president and CEO of FANUC America, a leading supplier of robotics and automation based in Rochester Hills, Mich. “It’s evident that Michigan is quickly regaining its strength as a manufacturing and technology powerhouse, and we’re proud that our headquarters has been in the Detroit Metro area since 1982.”
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