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Latest Updates
Conference News
WEDNESDAY: 7:30 AM–4:30 PM | Room S105abc
The Crane Manufacturers Association of America is hosting its annual educational conference today, April 10. Attendees will receive insight into the latest developments in overhead crane safety and earn seven professional development hour credits. Separate fee and registration required. Visit CMAAcranesafety.org to learn more and register. WEDNESDAY and THURSDAY, April 10–11 | Room S103
For the 16th consecutive year, MHI is partnering with the College Industry Council on Material Handling Education (CICMHE), Material Handling Equipment Distributors Association (MHEDA) and the Material Handling Education Foundation (MHEFI) to present Student Days at ProMat 2019. With sponsorships from Bastian Solutions, Hanel Storage Systems, The Raymond Company, Toyota Material Handling USA and Vanderlande Industries, over 200 students will have the opportunity to attend ProMat, gain insights about what it’s like to work in the industry and network with other young professionals. Register here.
Keynotes, Sessions & Seminars
 WEDNESDAY: 8:45–9:45 AM | Room S100
George W. Prest, CEO, MHI & Scott Sopher, Principal Deloitte Consulting LLP’s Supply Chain Practice This is your opportunity to be the first to have access to this new report on the trends and technologies that are transforming supply chains. Scott Sopher, the principal with Deloitte Consulting LLP’s Supply Chain practice will join George W. Prest, CEO of MHI, in presenting the findings and moderating a panel of manufacturing and supply chain leaders. Panelists: • Randy V. Bradley, Assistant Professor of Information Systems and Supply Chain Management, Haslam College of Business, The University of Tennessee • Annette Danek-Akey, SVP Supply Chain, Penguin Random House • Jim Liefer, CEO, Kindred AI • Joel Reed, CEO, IAM Robotics
WEDNESDAY: 1:00–2:00 PM | Room S100  WEDNESDAY: 4:30–7:00 PM | Room S100 
Best of MODEX Daily
 “I am not a coder.” Not exactly the first thing you’d have expected to hear keynote Reshma Saujani – founder and CEO of Girls Who Code – say when she stepped on stage for her presentation Tuesday morning. She also admitted to crashing as a lawyer (“I just quit.”) and failing in her run for Congress (“Best 10 months of my life, but I was broke, humiliated… and had no contingency plan.”). Hmmm… still wondering where this is leading and how it will connect to Saujani achieving her lifelong goal of wanting to “change the world and give back to this nation that saved my parents’ life (who came as refugees to the United States in 1973).” How did a “non-coder” make coding cool – and accessible – for girls? It started with a simple step, the purchase of the URL, www.GirlsWhoCode.com. And the more steps Saujani took, the more she realized the gender disparity in the workforce when it came to computer sciences and coding. As a child of two engineers, she wondered, “Where are the girls? It became an obsession for me.” Saujani saw that the percentage of girls getting involved in computer sciences was going down and even gathered some stats that showed computer science grads were at 60,000 in America and at 350,000 in China. It was right about then that Girls Who Code went from a walk to a full-out sprint – and has continued along this path ever since. Since then she has battled culture, parenting styles, diversity, financial means, and even stereotypes in her quest to increase her reach. Yes, many 8-16 year-old girls envision a computer programmer as a dude wearing a hoodie, sitting in the basement, drinking a Red Bull and hasn’t showered, shared Saujani. This stereotype is part of the culture shift that needs to happen, where Barbie DOESN’T defer to a male to answer technical questions or females in TV shows DON’T want to go shopping instead of learning math. “Culture matters,” said Saujani. “We are telling them they are not for this industry.” The idea of perfectionism was another revelation that has helped Saujani understand more about the “why.” As girls get older they get addicted to perfection, said Saujani. All this perfectionism is causing two things: women are unhappy and there is a leadership gap. “We are waiting to be perfect to lead,” explained Saujani. “We have stopped doing things we can’t execute perfectly.” With Girls Who Code, the goal was to get them comfortable and not be afraid to make mistakes. Which is something we can all learn from, same as practicing bravery, practicing imperfection and “just starting.” Take that first step. Remember that “nobody cares about that typo,” said Saujani. Remember riding down that hill at full speed on your bike and “how you felt so dam alive!” Don’t walk away from the challenges that life presents and don’t allow your children, especially your girls, to do so either.
If you are not on the bus with industry 4.0, then you are under the bus,” was how Jason Walker, CEO and Co-founder of Waypoint Robotics started off the seminar, The Workforce: Design for Them or Fail at Industry 4.0, held in the RoboBusiness Theater on Tuesday. “You will be so inefficient you will be uncompetitive.” Not an ideal position for a small- or mid-sized company, yet many are occupying it as they “have been left behind with the automation boom,” explained Walker. But it doesn’t have to remain this way. “We think making automation and robotics more accessible to more people is the solution,” said Walker. “And we want to make sure people are included in the Industry 4.0 revolution, too.” Why are people important in a robotics revolution, you might ask? Walker said they’ve figured it out, and it is the Bobby (or Betty) First philosophy. “Bobby is the person who has been at the factory for 20 years,” said Walker. He knows his job backward and forward, and everyone loves Bobby. “Our approach is to make a robot that the Bobbys of the world can use. If you can empower the people who have been doing that all along…. it is going to be better for everyone in the long run.” Also, empowering the Bobbys to make decisions means that you are, essentially, enabling your robots to be “nail-guns instead of hammers.” The workforce should expect more from their robots, added Walker. One memorable example Walker shared had to do with rebuilding automatic transmissions. The technicians involved in this “incredibly complicated, brain-intensive job” of doing the actual rebuilding were also being tasked with moving the 300-pound completed piece to a different location once they were done – a process that was physically demanding, time-consuming and “intellectually frustrating.” In this case, the idea of bringing on robots to perform this aspect of the job not only made all the current technicians ecstatic, it had to possibility of being used to attract additional qualified talent as well. “If workers have to do this at one company and not the other, which one is going to win that technician?” asked Walker. In a nutshell, said Walker, “robotics companies should design for the workforce and chief robotics officers (CROs) should buy products designed for the workforce.” Daily Schedule
These sessions are located in the Emerging Tech & Sustainability Theater and the RoboBusiness Emerging Technologies Theater in the North Hall of McCormick Place. The RoboBusiiness sessions are part of the collocated Chief Robotics Officer Summit. Sessions are free to ProMat attendees. 10:30 AM – 11:00 AM: THE ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF AN EXECUTIVE FOR IMPLEMENTING A ROBOTICS AND AUTOMATION STRATEGY IN MATERIALS HANDLING
Robotics Officer Summit—RoboBusiness Theater Sessions at North Hall 10:30 AM – 11:15 AM: REUSABLE TRANSPORT PACKAGING – IMPLEMENTING & IMPROVING REUSABLE PALLET, CONTAINER & TOTE PROGRAMS Emerging Tech & Sustainability Sessions at North Hall 11:30 AM – 12:00 PM: THE SHIFT TO FLEXIBLE AUTOMATION Robotics Officer Summit—RoboBusiness Theater Sessions at North Hall 11:30 AM – 12:15 PM: COLLABORATIVE ROBOTS AND THE SUPPLY CHAIN OF THE FUTURE Emerging Tech & Sustainability Sessions at North Hall 12:30 PM – 1:15 PM: APPLYING MACHINE LEARNING TO OPTIMIZE THE SUPPLY CHAIN Emerging Tech & Sustainability Sessions at North Hall 1:30 PM – 2:15 PM: GETTING STARTED WITH AI AND MACHINE LEARNING TO IMPROVE WAREHOUSE MANAGEMENT Emerging Tech & Sustainability Sessions at North Hall 2:00 PM – 2:30 PM: COLLABORATIVE ROBOTICS AND THE SUPPLY CHAIN OF THE FUTURE Robotics Officer Summit—RoboBusiness Theater Sessions at North Hall 3:00 PM – 3:30 PM: THE ROLE AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF EXECUTIVES ASSIGNED FOR IMPLEMENTING A ROBOTICS AND AUTOMATION STRATEGY Robotics Officer Summit—RoboBusiness Theater Sessions at North Hall
MODEX Insights
Complimentary shuttle buses will run between McCormick Place South, Level 1, and designated show hotels from April 8-11, 2019. Buses will run on designated routes every 15-20 minutes during the following hours: WED: 7 AM - 11 AM; 3 PM - 8 PM
THURS: 7 AM - 11 AM; 2 PM - 5 PM Bus schedules will be posted at McCormick Place South and in each hotel. The buses will pick up and drop off on Level 1 of McCormick Place South.
Se where everything will be located at McCormick Place. Also, check out the Show Floor Map, which is interactive and includes the most up-to-date information and the detailed PDF floor plans.
The 2019 MHI Innovation Award winners will be revealed tonight during Industry Night. More than 108 submissions were received this year! The four finalists in each category were announced prior to the opening of the show, but the winners of the most innovative products in each category—Best New Innovation; Best Innovation of an Existing Product; and Best IT Innovation— will not be revealed until tonight by MHI's CEO George Prest. Stay tuned!
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Today is the big day! Starting bright and early with the much-anticipated preview of the 
ProMat 2019 includes collocated sessions of the Chief Robotics Officer (CRO) Summit presented by Robotics Business Review. Conference sessions focus on automation, AI, robotics and the latest intelligent technologies for supply chain operations. Sessions are taking place in the North Hall all day today!
