Automate Mini-series Episodes

If you've ever been to the Automate Show, you know one thing is guaranteed...
You can't see everything.

Between the conference sessions, Automate Theater, hundreds of exhibitors, live demos, and conversations happening across the show floor, there's simply too much great content for one person to catch.

That's exactly why we created our Automate Mini Series.

Over the next few weeks, we'll be sitting down with speakers from Automate 2026 to bring some of the show's best ideas directly to you. Whether you attended and missed a session (or couldn't make it this year at all) these conversations will help you catch up on the topics shaping the future of industrial automation.

Aug. 20, 2026

Automate mini series: Amanda Beaton

Most people in industrial automation agree we have a skills gap, but we keep aiming the message at ourselves. We sat down with Amanda Beaton from Siemens to talk about the side of Automate that deserves a bigger spotlight: Education Day, student tours, and the educators building the next wave of automation and robotics talent long before anyone applies for a job. Amanda runs Siemens Cooperates with Education in the US, bridging industry and academia by helping instructors get access to real Sie...

Listen to the Episode

July 30, 2026

Automate mini series: Christine Bush

ROI math can be brutally simple, and that’s exactly why it often fails in industrial automation. If your spreadsheet only asks “how many heads are we replacing,” you might get a clean payback number, but you also risk approving the wrong projects and rejecting the right ones. We’re joined by Christine Busch, who leads Schneider Electric’s Robotic Center of Excellence, to talk about what return on investment should look like when you’re trying to make robotics deployments truly successful. We di...

Listen to the Episode

July 10, 2026

Automate mini series: Wesley Garrett

Most automation projects stall long before the first robot moves. Not because the technology isn’t ready, but because buying feels like a maze: vague budgets, endless “it depends” quotes, and months of back-and-forth just to learn what something costs. We sit down with Wes from FANUC to talk about a different path for manufacturers, especially in food and beverage packaging: standard, scalable robotic solutions you can pilot quickly and then replicate across lines or plants. We dig into what “a...

Listen to the Episode