AI and Manufacturing Redux

ITMS 2026

Two years ago I attended the International Manufacturing Technology Show in Chicago's McCormick Place and found a rather limited focus on artificial intelligence among the exhibitors. ITMS is back in town so I went again this week. A quiet respite from all the AI/math angst, though that will come in full view when mathematicians take over the same venue in January.

I picked up my badge, the last to say "Illinois Tech" as I registered for a free academic pass well before the layoffs. Of course, you get to see all sorts of neat machines that make stuff but I tried to focus on where artificial intelligence plays a role. This time you could see AI everywhere, though as one exhibitor said, more of a marketing scheme than deep use of modern artificial intelligence. Real artificial intelligence did make appearances: vision recognition for robotic arms, backend software such as bid, invoice and document generation, predictive maintenance, and a variety of robotics, though mostly arms for assembling, cutting and even welding. 

I didn't see much of humanoid robots, digital twinning, use of large language models or manufacturing on demand. When do we get to the point that I can describe a product and have it designed, made and shipped to me quickly?

Not soon. I talked with someone from a small company that takes CAD designs and gets them ready for the manufacturing process. I asked him about automating the design phase and he said they leave that to ChatGPT. But OpenAI and Anthropic were nowhere to be found and Microsoft, Google and Amazon had scaled-down exhibits from two years ago.

Two years ago I remarked on the big booths for European and Asian manufacturers. This year had noticeably fewer giant foreign machinery stands. I'm guessing tariffs and trade uncertainty have dampened the influx of foreign suppliers.

China has gone all in on AI and manufacturing. I can imagine a Chinese slogan:

The US uses AI to make theorems, China uses AI to make products.