Inside the Industrial Autonomy Stack: Mining, Warehouses, and Perception Hardware from Pittsburgh
Manufacturing Happy Hour
Recorded live in Pittsburgh with the Pittsburgh Robotics Network, this episode of Manufacturing Happy Hour asks what industrial autonomy looks like when it leaves the lab and goes into mines, factories, and warehouses. Host Chris Luecke brought together three executives who each work on a different layer of that stack. David Griffin is Chief Sales Officer at Seegrid, which builds autonomous mobile robots for material handling. Mike Smocer is CEO of Mine Vision Systems, which captures real-time 3D data underground. Brett Phillips is Chief Revenue Officer and General Counsel at Hellbender, which designs and manufactures the sensing and edge-AI hardware that autonomous products rely on.
Luecke split the conversation into three parts: concrete examples of autonomy in use and how quickly it is changing, how each guest's background shapes their approach, and why Pittsburgh has become a base for this kind of work. A consistent theme ran through all three. The panelists see physical autonomy as a problem of respecting existing workflows, doing careful engineering, and joining advanced technology to hands-on manufacturing, and they see the technology itself as only one part of that.
Three Companies, Three Layers of Autonomy
Each guest described their company in plain terms before getting into specifics. Phillips said Hellbender specializes in on-edge AI hardware development and called it the business of "manufacturing the eyes and the ears of the autonomy stack." In his account, two things set it apart. The first is a staff of "gray beard" engineers who have been doing this work for a long time. The second is that Hellbender handles both engineering (design and prototyping) and manufacturing under one roof, which he claimed makes it one of the only companies outside China to do so. What Hellbender mainly sells, he said, is a shorter time to market.
Griffin said Seegrid, like many Pittsburgh robotics companies, traces its origins to Carnegie Mellon. A professor there developed vision-based navigation "literally over two decades ago," long before vision navigation became common. Seegrid now moves materials inside industrial facilities for manufacturers, warehouses, and logistics companies, mostly with tow tractors and automated lift trucks. Its customers include both major and mid-tier manufacturers.
Smocer described Mine Vision Systems as a mining technology company. He warned that if someone has researched mining technology online, "there's a 99% plus chance" that what they found has nothing to do with his company's work. Mine Vision Systems creates what he called "measurable digital records" of a mine as it advances and the ore body is extracted. The 3D images are built in real time, with real-time location in a GPS-denied environment. In his view, the data feeds real-time decisions that carry millions of dollars of impact for companies pursuing critical minerals and precious metals.
Mining: Replacing Colored Pencils and Tribal Knowledge
When asked for a concrete example, Smocer first placed his company within autonomy. Capturing images and measurements is the sensing layer. He described a progression: once you capture what was "previously uncapturable," people can make better decisions first, then computers, and eventually machines act on that information.
Smocer said the value of the data is not in doubt, because mining companies "have been trying to capture it for centuries." In his account, the current method, without his company's technology, is "literally colored pencils and paper." Highly trained geologists walk up to the mine face and sketch what they see. The decisions made there affect the investment that flowed into the company over the previous decade, all the downstream processing, and the viability of the mine itself. He described these geologists as very good at their work but "completely underserved by inadequate information." Too much depends on tribal knowledge, results are inconsistent, and predictability is low. The problem is getting worse because few new graduates have these skills, so experienced people are retiring without anyone to inherit what they know.
He explained the economics in simple terms. Advancing an underground mine is "literally like building a tunnel and you don't know where it's going for the most part." The goal is to extract the valuable material without breaking more rock than necessary. Excess broken rock is waste that costs millions of dollars a year. Breaking too little means spending extra time on processing.
His example came from a customer that recorded data after every blast and fed it into a semi-autonomous process to update its mine plans day to day. The mine plan pointed one way. By reviewing the maps built blast by blast, in 10-foot by 10-foot increments, the team saw an opportunity in a different direction that was not visible to the eye. According to Smocer, they extracted $900,000 of value within three months of adopting the technology. He added that results of this size are "not uncommon" among his customers.
Seegrid: Replacing Labor at Large Companies, Augmenting It at Mid-Tier Ones
Griffin said manufacturing is currently Seegrid's largest business segment. With very large manufacturers, which he described as multi-billion-dollar companies with dozens of facilities, Seegrid has deployed hundreds of robots and, he said, saved them tens of millions of dollars a year.
The trend he emphasized from the past two to three years is a strong push from mid-tier, more regional manufacturers. He drew a distinction here. At larger manufacturers, automation sometimes means replacing labor. At mid-tier companies it is mostly about augmenting labor, taking on tasks the company "simply can't find people to do" because it cannot hire and keep enough workers. He described regional manufacturers deploying dozens of robots that cover the work of several dozen employees a year. He said this is what lets them scale and keep growing.
Hellbender: Building Perception Systems at Scale
Phillips said that Hellbender does not "currently" sell end solutions, and he flagged that word as foreshadowing. Today the company designs, engineers, and manufactures components that go into autonomy products, as well as some complete products. He mentioned that Hellbender manufactures Mine Vision Systems' products.
His main example was a Fortune 200 company building its own autonomy model for its vertical. That customer hired Hellbender to engineer, design, and manufacture a high-fidelity data collection and perception system, which he said is known in the self-driving world as a "tiara." Hellbender makes its own PCBs and does full box-build assembly in-house. Phillips said this lets it bring products to market much faster, both in getting them working and in producing them at scale. For this customer, Hellbender expects to produce "thousands and thousands of units in months," which he estimated would have taken years five or ten years ago.
How Fast the Capabilities Have Changed: From Pallets to "Anything Forkable"
Luecke asked each panelist how much autonomy has changed in just a few years. Griffin used automated lift trucks as his example. Only several years ago, he said, autonomous lifting was largely limited to standard wooden pallets moved floor to floor or floor to conveyor. More recently, better perception systems, control systems, and AI and machine-learning algorithms have expanded that. He said Seegrid's trucks can now pick up almost any forkable container and place it on any surface or location that will accept it.
He said this changes the scope of automation in a facility. Where there were once a handful of candidate applications, there are now "dozens and sometimes hundreds," because the perception and control capabilities have improved so much.
From a Three-Year, Multi-Million-Dollar Project to Months and Under a Million
Phillips said technology is advancing rapidly and cited Moore's law, which he described as doubling "every single year." He said Hellbender has experienced that pace directly. Much of its executive team spent years on autonomous projects at CMU, specifically at NREC, and worked on what he called the first safety-certified autonomous floor scrubber. By his recollection, that project took about three years and "millions and millions of dollars."
Hellbender recently signed a new customer to develop a roughly analogous product with a smaller form factor. Phillips expects it to take months and less than a million dollars in engineering cost. He credited several factors: open-source technology, faster progress in sensors and models, and advances in material science and form factors. He said his team is "standing on the shoulders of giants" and that the trend is continuing.
Mining: From Point Solutions to Systems, Then to Native Applications
Smocer spoke specifically about mining and made two points. First, the industry is moving from automating individual vehicles or pieces of equipment toward a system-based approach. He called this the natural course of technology in general, from point solutions to workflows. The system might be your own IP or someone else's, and he said acquisitions in the industry tend to follow this pattern.
Second, he placed mining in a sequence of adoption. In his view, discrete manufacturing adopted digitalization and automation first, then process industries such as chemicals and materials, and mining came last. He expects mining to follow a similar path but to cover the distance much faster.
He said the first technologies to get attention in a newly adopting industry are usually ones that have already worked elsewhere. Moving them over still requires real application and engineering work, but "the evidence is in, it works." He recalled a presentation from about three years earlier by one of the largest mining companies in the world, a customer of his. It laid out a vision for autonomy and digitalization built around fleet optimization, fleet orchestration, and predictive maintenance. Apart from one mining-specific term, "load, haul, dump," he said it "could have applied to any number of industries."
In the second phase, which he sees starting now, companies build native applications from the ground up for mining because there is no analog to borrow from another industry. He said Mine Vision Systems is not the only company doing this and that the two phases are proceeding together. He sees the trend both in his own company's decision loop and in other parts of the mining production workflow.
A Lawyer in the Revenue Seat
For the background segment, Luecke started with Phillips's legal training, which he linked to the liability questions raised by driverless vehicles on Pittsburgh's hills. Phillips said the combination of a revenue role and a legal background is unusual and that its benefits go beyond autonomy. As a salesperson moves up, he said, deals increasingly close through contracts. He can make the business case to decision makers and then negotiate "very arbitrary and niche clauses" with their counsel while understanding how those clauses affect the deal.
He said autonomy adds its own issues, especially product liability, and called indemnification "always the big scary one." In his view, the legal background lets him think more holistically than a pure sales focus would.
Change Management as the Real Discipline
Luecke asked Smocer how he ended up in mining after roles at Ansys (following its 2008 acquisition of Ansoft) and at a company doing machine learning for chemicals and materials. Smocer declined to call it happenstance and accepted Luecke's suggestion of "Providence." He then explained the common thread. In every industry he has worked in, he introduced computer-based technology, mostly for product development, to organizations that had operated successfully for a long time without it. Consumer electronics and semiconductors were possible exceptions. The work, in his view, is transformation and change management.
He warned against disrupting workflows because a new technology "solved one little problem and broke 12." Doing that damages a vendor's reputation and also puts customers' careers at risk. At Ansys, the breadth of physics solutions let him tell customers the company would innovate faster than they were likely to adopt, which made it a safe bet. That supported multi-year partnerships built on the understanding that the customer would keep going after the first success. He said he has seen technologies fail because their makers "played their cards a little bit too close." They did not think about workflows, adjacent technologies, or the machines and people in those workflows, and they did not understand the domain.
He applied the same thinking to mining. The industry is behind, he said, because technology has not served it and the solutions did not exist, and slowness to adopt is not the reason. Miners have been "remarkably innovative in the absence of all this technology," and vendors need to respect that. They also need to show customers a vision beyond the first point solution and ask how the customer wants them to grow. He described these lessons from 30 years of work as the part he is proud of.
A Software Company That Drags Hardware Along
Luecke noted that Seegrid is Griffin's first job in manufacturing and robotics. Griffin said the thread in his career is software. He started as a software developer and has always worked for what he called "software first companies that actually drag a lot of hardware along for the ride."
He said Seegrid is often seen as a product company because its products weigh a ton and move multiple tons of material. He considers it a software company. In his description, the hardware is "essentially a near commodity at this point." The value is in navigation, safety, perception, and control, which are software capabilities running on that hardware. He pointed to Seegrid's headcount: 12 software engineers for every hardware engineer. The end product, as he put it, is a result expressed as ROI, which makes his current role very similar to his earlier ones. Phillips joked that a former software developer now working in sales made Griffin "a real unicorn."
Why Pittsburgh: Pragmatism and Blue-Collar Innovation
Smocer and Phillips have deep Pittsburgh roots. Griffin is from Virginia and spent most of his life in Atlanta. Phillips grew up moving around as a military child, graduated high school in the region, and married into a Pittsburgh family.
Smocer has lived in Pittsburgh all but six years of his life and studied at the University of Pittsburgh as an undergraduate and graduate student. He pointed out, with a joke, that Luecke had left Pitt off his list of anchor institutions. He said he chose the startup community years ago because he wanted to take part in how technology, much of it robotics and automation, was changing the city. When he graduated, he said, some sections of the city people avoided are now its hottest spots. Healthcare has always been there, the steel industry moved out, and "it's really technology that filled that gap." He described himself as "comfortable being uncomfortable." He spent three years as CRO for a Silicon Valley company that he still advises, and he called Silicon Valley "the standard in terms of the success stories." What he values in Pittsburgh is its pragmatism, a "get things done type of attitude that doesn't have a lot of fluff around it." He avoided the word "grittiness" as overused.
Griffin said he has spent a lot of time in the region over the past five years and named two things that stand out. First, although Seegrid is an innovative robotics company, it is "a blue-collar business." Its products operate in dirty factories, busy warehouses, and fast-paced logistics environments, and most of its field employees do blue-collar work. He said Pittsburgh people combine that grit with innovative thinking. Second, the region allows cross-pollination. Seegrid hires many people from the University of Pittsburgh and also from local industries such as medtech and manufacturing.
Phillips agreed and tied the blue-collar point to physical AI. He said any autonomy system has to interact with the physical world, so "you have to have people that are willing to get their hands dirty." He said he would "die on the hill" that Pittsburgh's engineering talent matches Silicon Valley's, and argued that, given the history of autonomy stemming from CMU with Pitt also playing a large role, Pittsburgh could be called "the OGs" of the field. What he thinks will set the city apart going forward is the ability to combine high-level technical engineering with real-world manufacturing, including "burning your hands on soldering irons." He called that part of Pittsburgh's culture.
The Pittsburgh Robotics Network as a Business Engine
Luecke said PRN is one of the more active industrial communities he sees across the country. Phillips called PRN "the OG" and said other organizations copy its model. He said its monthly happy hours often draw hundreds of people, where most places would be lucky to get around 50, and that they are valuable for the industry's culture and for networking. He also emphasized that PRN now brings in industry-specific groups that create real business development opportunities. His example was a utility roundtable held the Monday before the recording. Hellbender and a couple of other companies in the audience took part, and he called it "a really prime field for us to get some new work." He said PRN understands it is a cultural engine and also that companies need business to survive.
Griffin said he has made several important contacts through PRN events over the years. A convention-center event a few months earlier produced both customer and partner leads. Seegrid has also found local suppliers for parts and service through the network, which means it now does business with and supports the local community.
Smocer gave numbers. At his first startup, an investor told him he rates a company's chances higher when he sees several people who have worked together before. At Mine Vision Systems, Smocer told his team they should not need recruiters in a community that is among the best robotics centers in the country, and that they should use their network and PRN instead. He said the company hired 18 people over the past year or so and that 14 of them had previously worked with someone already at the company. He gave first credit to his team's advocacy and called PRN "1B." His VP of engineering asked for a PRN membership within three months of joining.
Advice for Manufacturers Still on the Sidelines
In a rapid-fire round, Luecke asked how a manufacturer that has been watching from the sidelines should begin. Griffin's first answer was to "get started immediately," because autonomy is a journey that takes time. His second was to "start with a win." That means choosing an achievable, low-risk application that causes little operational disruption and needs little change management with employees, then adding a second win and increasing complexity and significance from there.
Phillips agreed and added that companies should understand the ROI calculation thoroughly. He said many missteps come from chasing the buzzword without understanding the impact. His advice was to start with a limited scope, get it right, and use the ROI analysis to set that scope. Luecke asked why Phillips said "it's never been easier." Phillips pointed to vendors like the three on stage. He also said autonomy was true R&D ten years ago and "sort of a pipe dream" twenty years ago. Today, he said, the question is whether you can identify the right use case and execute, and execution often "comes down to change management more than it does the technology."
Smocer cautioned about balance. "If you don't know what to do, do something" becomes reckless if done badly, and insisting on a complete strategy can lead to endless analysis with no action. A company can't be "a slave to either one." Applications differ, so wins have to be chosen strategically. He reminded buyers that adopting autonomy is a transformation and that employees understand their careers are affected, so leaders have to help people through it. His last point was about partners. They do not need to have everything figured out today, but they should be credible, have been through similar work before, have a vision, and be willing to engage with the customer's perspective. Because "nothing is completely figured out" and everything is moving fast, he advised choosing partners who will be around for multiple years.
Pittsburgh's Next Chapter: Success Stories, Exits, and Telling the Story
For the closing question on Pittsburgh's future role, Smocer came back to success stories. He said he joined the startup community to help create a virtuous cycle with local talent. He wants everyone, whatever their role, to understand they represent a community and to aim for outcomes that are visible and measurable in business terms, not only technical ones.
Griffin made the point more concrete. In his view, success stories lead to capital-injecting exits. Those exits fund the next round of angel investors and serial entrepreneurs, and the mid-to-upper-level leaders of successful companies become senior executives at the next wave of Pittsburgh startups. More capital, confidence, and capability build on each other, which he called "a self-fulfilling prophecy over time." He said Pittsburgh has not yet seen this at the scale he expects in the next few years.
Phillips said Pittsburgh is at "a very unique point in time." Drawing on the city's steel history, he described an opportunity to be "the vehicle for the physical AI world," with autonomy as one vertical within it. He saw the main challenge as cultural. The region has the engineering and manufacturing talent, he said, but is "a little too Midwestern humble." In his view, pride in being gritty often means being quiet and showing up to work with a lunch pail. He said Pittsburgh could learn from how Silicon Valley, Boston, and New York sell a story and a vision, and should talk about its strengths knowing it can back them up. He pointed out that Silicon Valley already knows about Pittsburgh: "They come here and they buy companies and they hire people." The remaining task, he said, is to convince the rest of the world, especially non-technical business people, that "Pittsburgh is where you go to build autonomy, to build the physical AI world."
I'm definitely a Pittsburgh homeboy. I will tell you that. Now, when I graduated, there were sections of the city you didn't go to that are now the hottest spots in the city. Steel industry had moved out, but it's really technology that filled that gap. And the evidence is all around us. You have to have people that are willing to get their hands dirty. What's going to separate us moving forward is the ability to sort of mash this really high-level, very technical engineering with real-world manufacturing. That is where uniquely Pittsburgh stands alone.
Hey folks, this episode is all about autonomy. We're talking about autonomy across a variety of industries from mining to the warehouse and we recorded it in a city that knows autonomy, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This was a special live show in collaboration with the Pittsburgh Robotics Network where we sat down with three industry leaders from across the C-suite to discuss scaling autonomy in critical industries. David Griffin joins us from Seegrid to talk AMRs, Mike Smocer of Mine Vision Systems to talk mining, and Brett Phillips of Hellbender to talk perception systems.
Today we cover more than a few examples of autonomy in action and how autonomy is changing. We have a few unique career questions for each of our guests. And finally, we talk about Pittsburgh and why it's been the right ecosystem for developing autonomous technologies. If you want to connect with any of these guests or dive deeper into their organizations, make sure to check out the show notes page at manufacturinghappyhour.com. Now, let's head to Pittsburgh to meet up with Brett, Mike, and David.
All right, folks. Welcome to Manufacturing Happy Hour collaboration with Pittsburgh Robotics Network. Hey, let's give a round of applause for the Pittsburgh Robotics Network. First and foremost, this is an organization that I would say as the host of Manufacturing Happy Hour, I've started collaborating with them at least once a year now. One of the more active communities in the industrial space. A testament to all of you being here on a Thursday evening. So, thank you all for coming out here.
Also, raise your glasses to Fathom Digital Manufacturing as well. Give them a round of applause, too. First round of drinks. Any other incentive drinks are on them tonight. So, cheers to Fathom. We'll be bringing them up at the end of the episode.
But I'll give you a quick intro on Manufacturing Happy Hour really quickly, assuming that you don't know who I am. So my name is Chris Luecke. I run the show Manufacturing Happy Hour. It's a podcast where we talk about the latest trends and technologies impacting manufacturers, automation organizations the way you would over a beer, right? I was a sales guy in the industry for a long time. I'm like, there's got to be a different way we can talk about these topics in a way that's more accessible, goes beyond the buzzwords. And that's what we're going to be doing tonight in the context of autonomy.
So, we have a great panel with us up here. And I want to go through and do a couple introductions. So, you know, Brett, why don't we start at the end and then go this way if you want to introduce yourself and what you do and we'll dive into some questions right after that.
Sure. Sounds good. Thanks, Chris. I'm Brett Phillips. I'm the chief revenue officer and general counsel at Hellbender. By show of hands, I'm curious how many people have heard of Hellbender here. Awesome. We got to make sure we get that on camera if you're not getting that. A lot of hands being raised.
Hellbender, we specialize in on-edge AI hardware development. And what particularly makes us unique, other than deep, deep domain expertise, we are a company full of gray beard engineers that have been doing this for a very long time. But on the other end of it, we're one of the only companies outside of China that do both sides of the equation under one roof. That is the engineering, the prototyping, the design, and the manufacturing. And so that is particularly unique for us and it's obviously very on brand and relevant for the Manufacturing Happy Hour. Yeah, great to be here.
And before we get to David for your introduction, you know, if you were casually chatting with someone over a drink, how would you describe what your company does as it relates to today's topic of autonomy specifically?
Yeah. So, Hellbender specifically is really all about manufacturing the eyes and the ears of the autonomy stack. And so really what Hellbender does more than anything else is we allow you to shrink your time to market. And so we really bring that sort of subject matter expertise in that space, but also again the ability to not only engineer it, but produce it in our facility.
Yeah, David, we're going to go to you next. You're with Seegrid and for some behind the scenes on Manufacturing Happy Hour, we're celebrating our 10-year anniversary of the podcast and so that means we've done over 300 episodes. Well before episode 50, I believe Seegrid was featured on the show a long time ago. So there's some history there. So similar question for you. Introduce yourself and describe, you know, how you talk about autonomy in the context of your organization as if you're having a drink with someone.
Sure. David Griffin with Seegrid, obviously. We manufacture autonomous mobile robots. And so I think like many organizations here in the local community, our origin story starts at Carnegie Mellon. And so we had a professor that developed some really interesting technology that allowed for vision navigation long before vision navigation was a thing. So think literally over two decades ago.
And so we concentrate on moving materials in industrial facilities through manufacturers, warehouses, logistics companies, etc. Most specifically in the form of tow tractors and automated lift trucks. And so we do a lot of business with both major manufacturers and some mid-tier manufacturers. We've got a lot of success under our belt over the years and I really look forward to tonight. Thank you.
Absolutely. And Mike, how about yourself?
So Mike Smocer, I'm the CEO at Mine Vision Systems. Chris, we really appreciate you being here. I think for many of us that have lived here all of our lives, the transformation associated with technology is really what drives what we're doing today. And I think these events bring a lot of attention to what we're doing. So, I'll start off by saying that.
So as CEO of Mine Vision Systems, we're a mining technology company. If you've done any reading or Googling about mining technology, there's a 99% plus chance that what you found and what you've researched has nothing to do with what we're doing. And that's something we're proud of. We're doing something that has been underserved that is really at the tip of the spear, is the purpose for being, is the reason why exploration and all that money flows into mining at the get-go and why they ultimately get into production to optimize what we do at a mine face.
So I'll say simply we create measurable digital records of what's going on while a mine is progressing, while you're extracting the ore body that is again your purpose for being. These 3D pictures are developed in real time. They have real-time location in a GPS-denied environment. And the implications that they have to real-time decision-making has millions of dollars of impact to the way mining companies optimize their pursuit of critical minerals and precious metals.
And tonight's podcast is really going to take place in like three short acts. So I'll give you a little preview. We're going to dive into autonomy first and foremost, some of the stories, examples you've seen at your organizations. We're also going to get to know these gentlemen a little bit and some of their background and how that's impacted maybe some of your perspectives and work around autonomy.
And then just so you know, this is the third date on like a three-day Manufacturing Happy Hour road show. We've done live shows in Cleveland and Rochester before this. So this is officially the finale and it's been as much about the technology and manufacturing and robotics as it is about celebrating the industrial communities in these regions. So we're going to dive into Pittsburgh a little bit because at the end of the day there are going to be people that listen to this podcast from across the country and there are a lot of great things that you're doing here that those folks can learn from.
So let's jump into autonomy a little bit more. So, we did a little icebreaker there, but I'd love to hear a real-world example from each of you that really paints the picture of what each of your organizations are doing. So, can you each tell like a specific story of how your technology is making autonomy a reality in your specific applications? And we'll go the opposite direction this time. Mike, if you want to start us off, would love to hear about what you're doing, you know, an example in the mining space.
So let me establish first where we fit in in autonomy. The pictures we're taking, what we're measuring, what we're recording, that's the sensing aspect of autonomy. And when you capture what was previously uncapturable, you open up the door first for people to make decisions and then ultimately computers and ultimately impacting machines. And that's the continuum that we're on.
The technology itself, it almost sells itself. I got to be a little careful with that because it makes it sound too easy to our investors. But I'll make the point that there's not a question whether or not the data we're capturing is useful. Our customers have been trying to capture it for centuries.
The way they capture today absent our technology, which is pertinent to the answer to this question, is literally colored pencils and paper. So you have these highly trained geologists that are walking to a mine face where decisions get made that impact investor dollars that flowed into that company in the prior 10 years and all of the processing that occurs downstream, the very viability of the mine. So the way they capture the information that has this impact is literally colored pencils today. And that's because it's a complicated environment.
In a way, what I'm saying is that these geniuses underground, and they are really good at what they do, have been completely underserved by inadequate information. So, they're making these critical decisions, mission-critical decisions, with this inadequate information. There's too much tribal knowledge. There's too much inconsistency, very little predictability, and we're in an environment where there are very few people graduating with these skills that can then in turn build that tribal knowledge as people start retiring. So what we're doing is we're providing this opportunity for that to be captured in a way that's very consistent.
The stereotypical protocol for us is that every single time you advance a mine underground, and if you don't know much about mining, this part of it I can make simple. It's literally like building a tunnel and you don't know where it's going for the most part. And you're trying to optimize the extraction of everything that's underground without breaking any more than you have to, because anything more is waste and it costs a lot of dollars during the course of the year, literally millions, and if you break too little you spend all kinds of times processing.
So, one of our customers as an example is they were working through the mine. They're capturing data. They're recording that, taking that data into a semi-autonomous process to update their mine plans day to day. And the mine plan said go this way. But they discovered something that just by looking at it wasn't apparent. But by looking at the maps that they had been creating blast by blast, 10 feet by 10 feet, they decided that they had an opportunity in this direction. And they literally extracted $900,000 of value within 3 months of using our technology. This order of magnitude, these stories, they are not uncommon with our customers.
Yeah. So, one thing that I like about coming to Pittsburgh is it seems like everyone here is doing something with autonomy, automation, robotics, but you're all serving very different verticals, right? So, you just took us inside the mine, Mike. David, can you take us inside the warehouse now with an example of what Seegrid and AMRs are doing?
Sure. Our biggest business segment right now is actually manufacturing. A lot of different reasons for that. We've got a lot of success stories with very major manufacturing companies. Think dozens of facilities, you know, multi-billion dollar organizations. We've deployed hundreds of robots, dozens of facilities, saving them tens of millions of dollars a year. Really fascinating stories for companies of that size.
What we've seen more recently, the last two to three years, we've seen a really heavy push from mid-tier manufacturers, much more regional and localized based manufacturing where we can really get in and augment labor. And so sometimes with the larger manufacturers, it does get into the replacement of labor. With the mid-tier manufacturers, it's much more about the augmentation of labor. We're able to secure applications and activities that they simply can't find people to do. They can't hire and retain enough employees.
And so we have many different examples of regional manufacturers nowadays where we're deploying dozens of robots that's saving them, you know, several dozen employees a year, which makes a really big difference. Allows them to scale, allows them to continue to grow their business, having a lot of success with the automation.
So, Brett, let's go to Hellbender.
Yeah. So, Hellbender is a little unique in the sense that at least currently, a little bit of foreshadowing for you there, but currently we don't actually provide any end solutions. Right now, we specifically are involved in the design, the engineering, and the manufacturing of lots of various components that go into autonomy and/or autonomy products themselves. Not to put Mike on the spot, but we do manufacture Mine Vision Systems products specifically.
But in addition to that as well, right, currently right now we have a Fortune 200 company that is trying to develop their own autonomy model for their specific vertical and so they reached out and engaged us to engineer, design, and manufacture the high-fidelity data collection perception system, colloquially known as a tiara, for those people that are familiar with the self-driving space.
And so Hellbender is unique in the sense of, you know, again, time and expertise is what we really sell more than anything else. And so because we have those gray beards in our office that have been doing this for a long, long time, and on top of that, we make our own PCBs, we have our full box build assembly in-house, we can get them to market way quicker, not only from a functional standpoint with the products themselves, but also at scale. And so with that particular company, we're going to be producing thousands and thousands of units in months, as, you know, maybe five, ten years ago that would have taken years and years.
Yeah. And I appreciate you doing a little foreshadowing for what you've done, what's to come, because that's actually what we're going to talk about next in terms of really how quickly you've seen things advancing in the space of autonomy. And David, since you've been in the middle on each of our last questions, you're going to lead this one off. So, I'd like to help our audience understand like how quickly autonomy is changing. Both our audience here in Pittsburgh, which I think sees it on more of a day-to-day basis, as well as the audience listening to this, you know, across the country, around the world, you know, can you each paint a picture as to how the potential and capabilities of autonomy has changed in just like a few short years and in the
context of your business?
Sure. Talking about automated lift trucks specifically, several years ago, most of the autonomous lift was focused on literally standard wooden pallet moves floor to floor, floor to conveyor, and basically the capability was constrained to that type of application, right?
Just over the last few years have we started to get much more complex and robust perception systems, control systems, AI, machine learning algorithms. We can now pick up almost any container that's forkable and we can put it on any surface or location that will accept it. And so we've gone from only standard wooden pallet floor to floor moves; now we can do most anything with a forkable object. And so that really opens the door. So think from a handful of applications within any given facility to dozens and sometimes hundreds of different applications now that you can consider automating, simply because the perception and control engines and capabilities of the products are now that much better.
And Brett, you were kind of leading the way in getting this conversation started. What would you say? How have you seen things change in just a few short years?
So it's really just the technology is progressing rapidly, right? Moore's law is obviously a foundational principle in the sense that it will double every single year, and we've certainly lived that. Specifically at Hellbender, a lot of the Hellbender executive team have been doing autonomous projects for many, many years at CMU, specifically at NREC, and our executive team specifically were in fact involved in the first safety certified autonomous floor scrubber. And it took them, I want to say, three years and millions and millions of dollars to complete that development.
And just recently we signed on a new customer to develop a somewhat analogous product, obviously a little bit smaller form factor, but it's going to be months and sub a million dollars in the engineering space and in the engineering cost. And that's a combination of open source, right? Obviously a lot of that technology is progressing, but it's everything, right? The sensors are developing at a much higher speed. The models are developing at a much higher speed. The material science, the form factors, everything is just progressing quite rapidly. And really, we kind of have the advantage of standing on the shoulders of giants before us, right? But we're certainly seeing that progression continue.
And Mike, how would you wrap this up for us?
So, I'll focus on the mining industry specifically, not autonomy in general. I'll say probably two things. The industry itself is moving from automating specific vehicles or pieces of equipment to more of a system-based approach, and I think that's a natural evolution for technology in general. You go from a point solution to a workflow. A system might be your IP, it could be other IP, but you see acquisitions in our industry and they're typically related to that.
The second thing that I'll say is the mining industry is behind all other manufacturing industries. Discrete manufacturing, there are differences among them. They're the first to adopt technologies that can be considered digitalization or automation, and chemicals and materials in the process area comes after that, and then mining after that. And I think the time period from the starting gun, whenever that happens to be, and the finish line, which doesn't exist, will be a lot shorter in mining. And I think it's going to follow a similar path though, and I think this system approach is one of them.
But what gets the attention first in an industry that hasn't done it before? To me, it's typically technologies that have succeeded in other industries that are transferable. It doesn't mean it's easy to transfer it. Application work has to be done. A lot of engineering needs to be done, but the evidence is in: it works. So you start moving.
If you looked at, and I did look at this, there was a presentation three years ago on the part of one of our global customers, and they're one of the biggest mining companies in the world, and they were pitching what autonomy and digitalization meant in terms of their vision. And if you read through it, fleet optimization, fleet orchestration, predictive maintenance, everything that they were talking about, except that they brought up load, haul and dump, which is a mining phrase if you're not familiar, except for that it could have applied to any number of industries. So it's symbolic of how industries get started with autonomy, digitalization, any type of technology in a way. And mining is no different.
But I think the second part of the answer goes like this. I think what happens next is there are native applications that don't really have an analog that can just be pulled over, that start to be built from the ground up, that are specifically built for that industry itself. We're not the only ones doing it. There are others, but I think that's now starting to become the second phase. They're all proceeding together. But I definitely see that being a trend, if I not only look at ourselves and the decision loop that we're trying to create, but also many others in other aspects of the mining production workflows.
So I mentioned that we'd be taking this in three parts. So we're getting to part two, which is some of the questions on your respective backgrounds, how that's prepared you for careers right now in autonomy. And Brett, I think yours is pretty fun because you have a legal background, and when I think
I guess the first time someone described legal as fun.
Yeah. Well, I think it's fun in the context of autonomy because I think about it in terms of driverless vehicles driving around the hilly streets of Pittsburgh, right? So, I think about
Liability.
I think about all the legal implications that go with that. So, I'm curious to hear your perspective: how has your legal background helped you navigate the world of autonomy, with a bit of a pun intended there?
Yeah. So, I think it's not exclusive to autonomy, although autonomy certainly presents its own unique challenges. Yeah, I think it is a unique combination to be in a revenue position with a legal background. And revenue is just a fancy way of saying sales, if you guys are not clear on that. But yeah, I mean ultimately, if you're successful or lucky enough to keep moving up in the sales world, you eventually get to the point where your deals are closed in the form of contracts. And that is where certainly my background is a unique advantage.
And so it allows me to wear multiple hats. And it's one thing to be able to talk with the business decision makers and make a persuasive, compelling case, but oftentimes you then got to turn around and talk with their counsel and argue over very arbitrary and niche clauses, and understanding sort of those implications and how it affects the business deal. And then autonomy is certainly unique in the sense of now you're dealing with product liability. Indemnification is always the big scary one for sure. But no, I do think it is a unique advantage because it allows me to think a little bit more holistically than just a sales focus.
Yeah. No, good answer. And Mike, yours is a bit of a different scenario.
It's not fun.
No, no, no, no, no. It is. Well, you can tell me how it's fun or how it hasn't been fun. That's your job in the answer here. But I'm curious, technology-wise I feel like I see some common threads throughout your career. You were at ANSYS, Ansoft. I'll let you kind of share a little bit about that, but I'm curious, how did you decide to double down on mining, or did that just kind of happen by happenstance in this case?
Well, happenstance doesn't sound good. So
Providence.
There. There we go. So I'll add one other company into that mix because it's relevant to the answer to the question, and that's Citrine Informatics, which was where I was before I joined Mine Vision Systems. And I think I started this answer actually a question ago, so let me refer to that.
Every one of these industries that I've always been part of, simulation software, machine learning for chemicals and materials, something that was in all of these industries changing the way they did business, in nearly all of my cases product development, and they all use computers and technology, and maybe with the exception of consumer electronics and semiconductor, all of them have been doing just fine before you got there, for centuries.
So there is a transformation involved. There's change management involved. There are workflows that if you disrupt them just because your cool technology solved one little problem and broke 12, not only will you lose on your reputation, but you're literally putting people's careers at risk. So there's an approach to selling such things. There's an approach to developing your technology such that it succeeds not only now but in the future.
The beauty of working for an ANSYS, for example, at the point I got there, they acquired Ansoft in 2008, is that there were so many different physics solutions. I used to be able to stand on stage to say, we're going to innovate. We're going to offer solutions at a pace that's faster than you're likely to adopt them. We're a safe bet. And then we're able to establish partnerships that look out into the future. We know it takes a while to change management process now, but we know you're not going to stop when we make you successful with that first step. Let's talk about what that looks like over multiple years. And I've seen technologies that never evolve beyond that. I've seen technologies that play their cards a little bit too close. They didn't think about workflows, adjacent technologies, machines, people that fit in that workflow. They didn't understand the domain they were working in. Fail.
And that is a great advantage, I would argue, as I come into an industry that is doing this behind the others, not because they're slower to adopt, because technology hasn't served them. The solutions haven't been there. They didn't have a choice. They're remarkably innovative in the absence of all this technology. They figured out ways to get things done. And we have to respect that, just like every other industry when you walk in. And we also have to talk to them about what the vision looks like beyond the point solution we're starting off with, how we can grow with them, how they want us to grow. And I think those lessons over 30 years of doing this are fun. I'm proud of them, and I think they directly apply to what we're doing in Mine Vision Systems. And I think that puts us in a fun position to work with our customers.
And David, this is your first foray in the manufacturing, robotics, warehousing space. Is that correct? Am I on the right path with that?
That's correct.
What's that transition been like? Where were you before, and what's it been like getting into this industry for the first time?
Sure. Yeah. The throughline of my career is software, and so I started my career as a software developer. I've always worked with and for what I call software-first companies that actually drag a lot of hardware along for the ride. Right? At the end of the day, software companies are selling solutions that deliver results, right? And so we often get labeled, Seegrid, as a product company. We sell products that weigh a ton, that actually move multiple tons of product around. But at the end of the day, we are a software company, right?
The hardware component of our product is essentially a near commodity at this point. It's the navigation systems, the safety systems, the perception systems, the control systems. All of these are software-enabled capabilities on a commodity piece of hardware. So just if you think about our headcount within our organization, we have 12 software engineers for every one hardware engineer at Seegrid. At the end of the day, we provide a solution that delivers results, and that result is in the form of an ROI. And so it is very, very similar to what I've always done in my career: software-oriented solutions that deliver results. It just happens to be in the form of an automated lift truck this time.
I appreciate you all taking us into your backgrounds a little bit. Brett, did you have something to say at the end?
I was just going to say, I want to make sure I heard this correct. You were a software developer to start, and now you're in sales. Wow, we got a real unicorn on stage here. That's amazing.
Yeah. No, that's awesome.
That's a very fair comment. I'm glad you brought that up, because we were about to switch gears to Pittsburgh really quickly, talking about the ecosystem here, and I'm very curious. Are any of you from this area originally?
All... Okay, so two out of three.
I am not.
Brett, where are you? Wait, no, David. So, David, you're not either.
I am not from Pittsburgh.
Where are you originally from?
I'm originally from Virginia. I've spent the bulk of my life in Atlanta, Georgia.
Okay, Brett, what about you?
I am from America.
All right.
Born and raised, Army brat, military brat. Grew up moving around.
I thought that might be where that answer was going. Well, in that case, Mike, I think we're going to have you answer this first, as the person that's been here the longest. But I would say it's not really a secret anymore. I think people are starting to catch on that Pittsburgh is a robotics and automation and autonomy hub. People realize there are anchor institutions here like Carnegie Mellon. You got the history, you've got the infrastructure. What I'm interested in hearing is what else is there that's a secret sauce to this ecosystem that allows companies like yours to succeed here, grow here, scale here. Mike, feel free to lead us off, but if you want to pass the buck, that's okay, too.
No, I definitely don't want to pass the buck on this one. I'm definitely a Pittsburgh homeboy, I will tell you that now. I've lived here all but six years of my life. And I'll just give you a brief personal comment about why I'm doing what I'm doing now. I worked for some great companies over my career, but I made a decision when I was much younger than I am now to get into the startup community, principally in Pittsburgh, because I wanted to be part of the growth that technology here in Pittsburgh, so much of it about robotics and automation, is contributing to the environment, the city that we live in. I'm a University of Pittsburgh undergrad and graduate student. You didn't mention that as an anchor institution, but that's okay, Chris.
My mistake.
And I'm fond of telling people that when I graduated, which was probably a lot earlier than most of you, there were sections of the city you didn't go to that are now the hottest spots in the city. And health care's always been there. It's continued to grow. The steel industry had moved out, but it's really technology that filled that gap. And the evidence is all around us.
I felt that more success stories in Pittsburgh would be meaningful. I was always comfortable being uncomfortable. I don't need to be at a big company with a reliable this, that and the other; that actually makes me uncomfortable. And I wanted to contribute to that. And it's because of what exists here and the institutions that we have and the technology that is commercializable.
So look, I think it's CMU. I think it's Pitt. I spent three years leading go-to-market as a CRO for a Silicon Valley-based company that I still
advise, and it's an incredible company. That taught me about that environment and what's different. I will never say anything bad about Silicon Valley. They are the standard in terms of the success stories. But I will say this about Pittsburgh. There's a pragmatism. Grittiness is overused, so I'll kind of leave that out for now. There's a get-things-done type of attitude that doesn't have a lot of fluff around it that makes me really proud to be here, and it's why I'm doing what I'm doing.
David, I'm going to... Yeah, round of applause for that. Pittsburgh homeboy getting the crowd going. I'm going to pass it to our transplants next. But before I do that, not only did I not mention Mike's alma mater in that comment, but I led off when I shook his hand tonight. We were talking about baseball. He's obviously a Pirates fan and I'm a Cardinals fan from St. Louis, so I'm not really doing myself any favors with Mike so far, but
I was a Pirates fan about six hours ago. I'm probably not.
It is opening day when we're recording this right now for many, many spots. So, David, as someone that isn't from here originally, what have you noticed? We've talked about great institutions like University of Pittsburgh, for example. What else is there here that makes it a great spot to grow and scale companies that are focused on autonomy like yours?
Yeah, sure. I've spent a lot of time in Pittsburgh, in the greater area, in the last five years, and there's really two things that stand out to me after having been in a long career in many other places. I was going to use the word grit. I didn't know that was
You can use it.
But at Seegrid, a very leading-edge, innovative robotics company, at the end of the day we are a blue-collar business. Our technology manifests itself inside of very dirty factories, very busy warehouses, very fast-paced logistics environments. And so most of our employees in the field are doing very blue-collar work, and the grittiness of the people in Pittsburgh combined with all of the innovative capabilities they bring, whether, you know, we have people that come from medtech, we have people that come from lots of different places, manufacturing environments, etc. So the ability to think and participate in a very innovative way in a very blue-collar environment really, really stands out to me.
And then the ability to kind of cross-pollinate across a lot of different... I had already mentioned medtech, but we source a lot of our employees from University of Pittsburgh specifically, but we also pull from a lot of different industries locally, and we've had a lot of success. It's really interesting to see.
Yeah, I like talking about pulling from those other industries. We've talked about the story of Pittsburgh's resurgence a little bit. We've talked about grit with and without using the word grit so far. So Brett, what would you add?
You know, I would definitely 100% agree. And by the way, I'm not from Pittsburgh, but I did graduate high school in the region. And my wife and her whole family are all from Pittsburgh, so arguably you could say the better half of me is from Pittsburgh. But no, I would 100% echo what David just said, particularly in that blue-collar element, and I think that's actually quite relevant for the autonomy space in particular, because ultimately any sort of autonomy is going to have some sort of interaction with the physical world. Physical AI is sort of the new in-vogue term, and just by the very definition of that, you have to have people that are willing to get their hands dirty, right? And that's certainly relevant in a manufacturing context.
And I do think that is what sort of separates us, particularly by comparison with, say, Silicon Valley. I absolutely will die on the hill that we have the same level of engineering talent. And if you know the history of autonomy, you could even argue that we are the OGs in that space, all stemming from CMU, although Pitt's obviously playing a big part in that as well. But yeah, I mean, it really is. But truly, I think what's going to separate us moving forward, particularly as we move into this age of physical AI, is the ability to sort of mash this really high-level, very technical engineering with real-world manufacturing, right? And burning your hands on soldering irons, right? And I think that is where uniquely Pittsburgh stands alone, in the sense that a part of our culture here is being able to get dirty and build things, right? And I think that's where we're really going to see us progress in this next coming, you know, decades.
Yeah. Let's take a deeper, even more specific dive into the culture, the ecosystem here. I do want to ask about Pittsburgh Robotics Network specifically relative to tonight's topic, because I travel around and do shows across the country like this quite a bit, and admittedly I see the Pittsburgh Robotics Network as one of the more active technology and industrial communities out there. So
They're the OG, by the way, Chris. They are the OG. All the other organizations are copying what Jyn and Matt and Josh and the crew have done.
And that's a great point, because that's actually the reason for this question, because I want other folks across the area, world, country to learn from the successes that are taking place here. So, Brett, I think we will start this question with you and we'll go down towards Mike. So how has being plugged into a community like Pittsburgh Robotics Network impacted your company's growth and access to resources, talent, all the above?
It's been huge for us. I think you sort of hit the nail on the head. It is a true holistic benefit. PRN does the monthly happy hours, which are really, really quite beneficial for the culture of this industry, for networking.
How many people have been to one of those, out of curiosity? I assume most of this room probably has. I mean, for people listening to this on the recording afterwards, hundreds of people show up to that. Most places would be lucky to have like 50.
Yeah.
So, I mean, if anything, Jyn and Matt and Josh should pick bigger venues for these events, because if you've been to them, they get hot, right? And they get crowded. But no, that's exactly right. And really, from a cultural perspective, it's invaluable. But I think on top of that as well, because they've been such trendsetters in this space, they are starting to bring in industry-specific groups that represent real business development opportunities for us. And I can give you a very timely example. On Monday they had a utility roundtable, and Hellbender, and in fact a couple companies in the audience, SKA Robotics, Hebotics, shout out, I see you, we were able to participate, and it was a really prime field for us to get some new work. And I think that really is what makes PRN unique, in the sense that not only do they understand that they're a cultural engine, but it doesn't stop there, right? Because ultimately we need business to survive and thrive, and they do a really good job of bringing that in and teeing it up for us.
Awesome answer. You know, if I'm a manufacturing leader listening to this outside of Pittsburgh, I'm thinking to myself, okay, what are the ways my organizations can bring in and provide introductions to these different verticals that I might be serving? David, what would you add to that? What's been your impression?
Yeah, as you mentioned in the leadoff, we've been participating at Seegrid for quite some time now. And so in the last several years, I've participated in several events. I've made several important contacts. Just the event most recently in the convention center a few months ago, not only did we get potential customer leads, but we got a lot of partner leads as well. And then I think over the course of the years, not only serving as a good networking mechanism for Seegrid recruiting, we've also been connected with a lot of local suppliers that we use, whether they're for parts or service. We're actually doing business and supporting the community very locally with people that we've met through this organization. That's been really good for Seegrid.
Yeah, by the way, David, are you looking for new suppliers, or, you know, always be closing?
That's right.
Go ahead.
Another great lesson that we didn't intend to teach tonight. ABC.
That's right.
Mike, how would you wrap up this one?
So, in my first startup, I was working as a CRO, and I had an investor say to me that one of the ways that he evaluates the potential for a company is he looks around, and he says, "If I see people that worked together before, not everybody in the same place, but multiple threads, then the likelihood of success for that company goes way up." And I think it's probably intuitive why he might have said that, but I hadn't thought of it at the time. And when I got to the company, I was really adamant with my team about, "No, we're not going to... sorry if you're a recruiter, I know there are a lot of very good ones, but we're in a community that is the best robotics center, or at least among them, in the country. We shouldn't need recruiters. We have a network. We should use it. We have PRN. Because that's how we're going to maximize our chances of succeeding."
And I can tell you in the last year plus we've hired 18 people. 14 of those have worked with somebody that was already at the company. We have an incredibly committed team. So I'm going to give first credit to my team and the work that they're doing and their advocacy for Mine Vision Systems. But definitely 1B is PRN. My VP of engineering, when I hired him three months after getting here, it was one of the first things he said to me. He said we need a PRN membership, and he explained the reasons why. They are aligned with the question, and it has been a big benefit for us.
All right. So we have two, I would say, rapid-fire rounds of questions before we bring a couple guests on the stage here at the very end. But the first one is very specifically around autonomy and action around autonomy. So David, we'll have you lead this one off for us. For manufacturers and industrial companies who are watching the evolution of autonomy from the sidelines right now, maybe have not been as active as the three of you have been up on stage, what would be your message to them on how to start an autonomy journey today?
Yeah, the first thing I would say is get started immediately, right? It is definitely a journey, and that journey takes time, and so the quicker you start, the quicker you can evolve through that journey. So that's the first piece of advice. The second thing I will say is start with a win, right? Pick an application that can be achieved, that's very low risk, less of an impact to your organization, less of an operational change, less of a change management situation with your employees. Get a win under your belt. Get a second win under your belt, and kind of keep progressing in complexity and significance from there. So, start as quickly as you can and start with wins.
Excellent answer. Brett, what would you bring to that one?
I mean, the real answer is ditto. So, nailed it. But I would say on top of that, really understand the ROI calculation, because I think a lot of people, when they misstep, they just chase the word without really understanding the impact. But again, I agree with David, the time is now. It's never been easier. It's never been a better time to get into it. But really, and again, I'm just going to echo David, start small, right? Understand the parameters, limited scope, and really nail it. And the key to understanding and scoping that is the ROI calculation, right? And really drill down into that. And I think that's really going to set you up for success.
Real fast, and I know this answer might be obvious to some, but why has it never been easier? I think it is important to define that for folks that might be banging their head against the wall right now.
So again, I think it's just, well, for one, there are companies like all of ours on the stage that make it easier than ever before to actually see that and actually be able to realize those benefits. But I think from a higher-level perspective, 10 years ago it was true R&D. Maybe 20 years ago it was sort of a pipe dream, right? But now it is just simply: can you identify the right use case
and can you actually execute? And like David referenced, a lot of times it ultimately comes down to change management
more than it does the technology.
Yeah.
Right. Which is a whole other podcast. We'll do that next time.
Yeah. It's funny. When I was here, jumping around the city with Jen and Maddie and the whole team last year, one of the common themes of really a lot of the activity we saw around Pittsburgh was people getting things out of the lab and into the real world being one of the big strengths of Pittsburgh. So Mike, how would you wrap up this one?
So I don't have a lot to add. These guys did a great job answering the question. I'd say there's some balance, though, between "if you don't know what to do, do something" and "make sure that you have a strategy," and you can't be a slave to either one. The first, if you do it wrong, you're reckless. The second one, you analyze forever and you don't do anything. I definitely agree with the idea of getting wins out of the gate. Not all applications are the same. This isn't a uniform "just do autonomy." You have to pick the wins. You have to be strategic and thoughtful about how you do that. But remember that it's a transformation. If you're the company acquiring that technology, remember that you're making a career decision; they all know that. So that's something you've got to teach people.
Pick the people you partner with carefully. They don't have to have everything today, but make sure that they're credible. They've been through some of these things before. They have a vision. They're willing to engage with you to understand what your perspectives are, because nothing is completely figured out. Everything is moving so fast, and you want to select partners that'll be there for you and with you for multiple years.
So that was the call to action. This last question is really, let's say, the summary of the conversation. Looking ahead, what does Pittsburgh's role in continuing to lead the autonomy and robotics space look like? Mike, we'll start with you and we'll just go down the line from there.
I think it's just important that we have success stories. Again, that was why I jumped into this environment in general, the Pittsburgh startup community. I wanted to see more success stories. I wanted to be a part of creating a virtuous cycle with all of the great talent that we have here in Pittsburgh. And I think if we all, no matter what our roles are at our jobs, at our companies, understand that we're representing a community, that there is an outcome that we want to be visible, measurable in the business context, not just in the technology context, I think that helps us all. It helps the community and increasingly keeps us on the map going forward.
David, what are your thoughts on Pittsburgh moving forward?
I'll build exactly on that point of more success stories, and I'll be a bit more specific from my perspective. These success stories essentially lead to very successful and capital-injecting exits, right? And those exits
create additional capital for the community, which allows the people to benefit from those exits. They're the next round of angel investors. They're the next round of serial entrepreneurs. The, you know, let's call it the middle to upper middle tier of leaders within those organizations that were successful now become the next tranche of senior level executives in the next batch of companies that come through Pittsburgh. And so you talk about building on success, you know, additional capital, additional confidence, additional capability within these organizations. It will become a self-fulfilling prophecy over time. And I don't think we've seen that yet to the scale that we're going to see in the next few years.
All right, Brett, take us home.
Okay, no pressure. Yeah, no, I mean I totally agree with, you know, everyone, what they just said. I do think that Pittsburgh is sitting at a very unique point in time. And I think that if we're going to hearken back to our steel days, right, I think that's what we're looking at here is the opportunity to be the vehicle for the physical AI world as we enter into this new space. Autonomy is one of those verticals.
But really I think the challenge for Pittsburgh is going to be to be bold and tell people, right? We have all the engineering talent in the world. We have all the manufacturing talent in the world. The problem is that we're a little too Midwestern humble, right? We pride ourselves on being gritty, which is another way of saying we're kind of quiet, right? And we go to work every day and we don't, you know, we bring our lunch pail, but I think we could learn a lot from what Silicon Valley does, from what Boston does, from what New York City does in the sense of selling a story, selling a vision, and really being proud and talking that talk and knowing that we can back it up.
And I think that is what's really going to make or break this city because quite frankly Silicon Valley knows. They come here and they buy companies and they hire people. The challenge is letting the rest of the world know, the super non-technical people, the business people know that Pittsburgh is where you go to build autonomy, to build the physical AI world.
Sounds like we just need to keep talking about Pittsburgh's role in robotics and autonomy. The way, you know, Mike, the way you'd flaunt the Steelers to the rest of the world, for example. I feel like that's a perfect example right there.
And Chris, you're helping that a lot with this podcast. And I want to say we all up here on the stage appreciate this opportunity. So, thank you very much.
Yeah. Thank you, Chris.
Well, thank you. Hey, give it up for Mike, for David, for Brett. Thank you for all you do. Thank you for all the Pittsburgh Robotics Network does. Thank you all for being here. So, one more round of applause for our panelists tonight. [applause]
So, we're going to have two special guests join us on stage right now. You guys are free to jump off the stage. Matt, I'm gonna have you come on second, actually. I'm gonna have Nick, if you want to jump up here first.
Nick is with Fathom and I'm going to give just a quick preview: you do rapid prototyping. So, I'm sure you're already inside of some of these spots here in Pittsburgh right now, but I'm going to really quickly ask you, as the partner of this Rust Belt Renaissance tour that Manufacturing Happy Hour has been on, how do you describe what Fathom does as if you're having a drink with someone?
That's awesome. I love explaining this. I'm actually the new guy, so my boss is watching, so I hope I do this right.
Bring the mic up just a little bit. Yeah.
Absolutely. So we're a manufacturing platform that has, what I call, it's composed of unique and special machine shops and facilities that give opportunities to a lot of companies in aerospace, medical, injection molding, anything. So we kind of work with companies to be able to make their ideas come to fruition and bring it to the manufacturing place.
Yeah. Well, hey, give him a round of applause for helping make tonight possible, helping make this whole tour possible. If you haven't yet, make sure to talk to Nick. Ian is over there as well, and my buddy Chris is in the back. These folks have been with me on this entire tour so far. So, if you want to learn more, make sure to connect with them. They're folks that I've worked with for a long time. So, great organization. Nick, thanks for jumping on up here.
Absolutely. And we have drink tickets.
Yes, they still have drink tickets in hand if you're looking for another beverage. And then last but not least, Matt, if you want to jump on. Oh, look at you coming out from behind the curtains. What an entrance.
I just want to put a disclaimer out there that we did not pay any of these guests to talk about the Pittsburgh Robotics the way they did. But yeah, like Mike, I am a born and raised Pittsburgher myself. Southside, you might hear a yinzer in my twang, but yes, I am very honored to be a part of this ecosystem. What we have going on here is very special and it's members like Mike and David and Brett that make this happen, as well as most of you in the audience.
If you're not a member and you want to be involved, I am your guy. You see the picture up there going on with my face on it. I did not do that. One of my co-workers did. But if you want to get involved with the flagship event, Pittsburgh Robotics and AI Discovery Day. Last year we had over 8,000 attendees. This year we're looking upwards to 10,000. It's part of CMU's Tech Week. A lot of stuff going on that week. There will be a lot of heavy hitters in town. Get involved. Talk to me. I'll get you set up and get you a booth at that Discovery Day.
But give it up for Chris and the Rust Belt Renaissance tour wrapping up in Pittsburgh. And give it up to Mike and David and Brett, and actually give it up for yourselves, the members, 'cause without you, this wouldn't be possible.
Yeah. Cheers to all of you. Thank you for being here.
So, if you want to get involved, I'm the guy to talk to. Thank you for coming out. We have some drinks afterwards and some more networking.
Yeah, continue to enjoy, continue to connect. We're going to sign off the way we always sign off a Manufacturing Happy Hour episode. Stay innovative. Stay thirsty. Cheers again to all of you. Enjoy the rest of the evening.
Thank you for coming out.
All right, one more thank you to add to that list. Thank you to all of you who just listened to the recording of this podcast. If you want to learn more and connect with any of our guests, make sure to do that over at the show notes page at manufacturinghappyhour.com. One final thank you to Fathom Digital Manufacturing for sponsoring our Rust Belt Renaissance tour. And thank you to the Pittsburgh Robotics Network for helping put together this episode.
Manufacturing Happy Hour is always hitting the road for live shows and events, and I hope to see you out there very soon. In the meantime, make sure to follow and subscribe to Manufacturing Happy Hour wherever you get your podcasts. Cheers.
Article published · Updated