Listen to this article

RoboBusiness, produced by The Robot Report, wraps up today at the Santa Clara Convention Center. The two-day event will bring together more than 60 speakers, over 100 exhibitors and demos on the expo floor, 10+ hours of dedicated networking time, the Pitchfire Robotics Startup Competition, a Women in Robotics Luncheon, and more. The show will focus on investment and business topics related to running a robotics company.

The show focuses on the technical challenges of building commercial robots and the business challenges of running a robotics company. Here’s a breakdown of what to expect on Day 2. You can still register for the event.

Keynotes

Opening Keynote: Building Robotic Foundation Models
Time: 10:00 AM – 10:45 AM
Location: Theater
Speaker: Sergey Levine, co-founder of Physical Intelligence and associate professor at UC Berkeley

General-purpose foundation models, such as ChatGPT, have demonstrated how general-purpose models trained on diverse datasets can outperform narrowly tailored specialist models, even on tasks those specialized models are specifically designed for. Can the same transformation happen in robotics? In this presentation, I will discuss how foundation models for end-to-end control of robotic systems can be built, how we can gather large and diverse datasets for such systems, and how they can enable new and exciting robotic capabilities.

Fireside Chat Keynote: A Conversation with Claire Delaunay
Time: 11:00 AM – 11:45 AM
Location: Theater
Speaker: Claire Delaunay, the CTO of farm-ng

Renowned roboticist Claire Delaunay will share her insights into the current and future state of robotics and various enabling technologies. She’ll also discuss her career journey, what it takes to build and scale startups and products, and the future of autonomous farming.

Closing Keynote: Live Demo of Endiatx’s Swallowable Robot Pill
Time: 3:30 PM – 4:30 PM
Location: Theater
Speaker: Torrey Smith, the co-founder and CEO of Endiatx

Endiatx develops swallowable robot pills for telemedicine. The PillBot is a virtual endoscope that gives doctors a real-time look inside the human body. Endiatx Co-Founder and CEO Torrey Smith will take us inside the robot’s development, detail its benefits, and close RoboBusiness with a live demo of PillBot on stage.

Expo Hall

The RoboBusiness exhibit hall will be open from 10:00 AM until 3:00 PM on the second day of the show. It features over 100 exhibitors, including the Formant Demo Zone. The Demo Zone will feature robots from Canvas, Clearpath Robotics, Burro, Field AI, and Slalom. 

On the show floor robotics engineers will find industry-leading companies such as Harmonic Drive, Kollmorgen, Robust AI, PickNik Robotics, Bota Systems AG, Novanta, and more. 

Additionally, visitors should visit the Startup Showcase. Here, you can get a look at cutting-edge technology from companies at the beginning of their robotics journey. The showcase will include demos from Dalus AI, Copper Robotics, Summer Robotics, Open Droids, Inception Robotics, Robotics88, and dexman.ai. 

For the first time at RoboBusiness, attendees can also check out the Engineering Theater on the expo floor. On the second day of the show, the theater will feature talks from MathWorks, Future Bot Solutions, and Ati Motors. 

Conference Sessions

The agenda features five tracks covering design & development, driving business, enabling technologies, field robotics, and innovation. On Day 2, at 1:30 PM, we’ll be hosting a Robotics Investments Trends panel. This session will bring together investors and roboticists to discuss the challenges and opportunities of raising money for your robotics company. This panel will discuss the current state of robotics investments, macro trends, how the landscape has changed, what applications and technologies are finding commercial success and more.

The panel includes Ivy Nguyen, a Principal Investor at Autotech Ventures; Schuyler Cullen, the co-founder and CEO at Summer Robotics; Eric Truebenbach, the managing director at Teradyne Robotics Ventures; and Eugene Demaitre, the editorial director of Robotics at WTWH Media. 

The second day of the show will also feature talks from Applied Engineering, Jacobi Robotics, Point One Navigation, Scythe Robotics, GITAI, PickNik Robotics, Ati Motors, Formant, Blue River Technology, SKA Robotics, Tangram Vision, Outrider, Opteran, and Blue River Technology.

Networking events

For the first time at RoboBusiness, we’ll be hosting a Women In Robotics Lunch from 12:45 – 1:30 PM. Join robotics industry peers for some valuable networking, engagement, and mentorship (and food and drink, of course). Attendees will also hear from Allison Thackston, a leading roboticist who is solving some of the toughest problems in agtonomy at Blue River Technology. Pre-registration is required.

We’ll also be holding a networking break to give attendees an opportunity to follow up with speakers or other colleagues. This will take place at 12:45 PM.