Automation built American manufacturing, and it’s about to reshape it again. With the 2026 edition of IMTS – The International Manufacturing Technology Show on the horizon, automation is moving beyond a technical focus to become a strategic lever for addressing workforce constraints, accelerating productivity, and strengthening U.S. competitiveness.
Our industry faces a structural workforce gap, with roughly 495,000 open jobs in January 2026, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Hiring alone won’t close it. But we can get there with intelligence, technology, and our uniquely American ability to innovate and embrace change.
American Manufacturing Spirit
To appreciate just how deeply automation and innovation are ingrained in American manufacturing, recall Season 1, Episode 1 of “Road Trippin’ with Steve” and our visit to the American Precision Museum. The museum’s home, the former Robbins & Lawrence Armory in Windsor, Vermont, is widely recognized as one of the birthplaces of machining, repeatable precision, and interchangeable-part manufacturing. Entrepreneurs took technologies developed for the mass production of colonial firearms and quickly adapted them for making consumer products, spurring the Industrial Revolution.
To succeed in the digital era, we need to expand our vision. We’ve somehow narrowed our concept of automation to purely physical movement; yet, as Merriam-Webster defines it, automation is “the technique of making an apparatus, a process, or a system operate automatically.” By focusing solely on the physical apparatuses and movements of a manufacturing workflow, we miss part of the opportunity automation offers. In other words, if we address a factory’s processes and systems – like data flow, decision-making, and anything else that creates a bottleneck – we can achieve greater manufacturing efficiency and growth to address the challenges outlined above.
Here are some areas that can benefit from automation:
Concept and product design
Estimating and quoting
Manufacturing and process engineering
Enterprise resource planning (ERP) and manufacturing execution systems (MES)
Material procurement, scheduling, and inventory management
Machining, production, assembly, finishing
Inspection, quality control (QC), quality assurance (QA)
Packaging and shipping
Customer service (Caution! Bad chatbots drive customers away)
Part performance, maintenance, and life-cycle management
Continuous improvement
Closing the loop between all systems (model-based engineering)
Approaching Automation at IMTS 2026
Searching for automation at IMTS starts by identifying your bottlenecks, problems, and goals and mapping them to the corresponding “apparatus, process, or system” in the 10 Technology Sectors at IMTS 2026. Next, rely on your traditional relationships and build new ones, because those who know your business will help you the most.
To prime you for finding automation, here are just a few examples of automation successes visitors to IMTS have discovered and implemented – and what they may expect at this year’s show.
1. Automation
The Automation Sector, launched at IMTS 2024, features more than 260 exhibitors, including global automation giants, software and digital manufacturing leaders, established providers, and innovators of all sizes.
After a demonstration at IMTS 2024, Mindrum Precision acquired three machine-tending systems from Hurco/ProCobots (IMTS booth #338319), featuring arms from Universal Robots (IMTS booth #236744). Machine uptime jumped to more than 160 hours per week (a 41% production boost) and lowered cost-per-part by up to 55%.
Hands-on demonstration of a ProCobots Profeeder Tray system in the Hurco booth at IMTS 2024.
2. Additive Manufacturing
AM is inherently automated; how far you can automate it is up to your imagination. AMT – The Association For Manufacturing Technology’s Emerging Technology Center (ETC) (IMTS booth #236700) featured a convergent manufacturing platform that combines AM, 5-axis machining, robots, pallet pools, heat treatment, and more for a “done-in-one” system to create more robust supply chains, reduce energy consumption, and bring new efficiencies to tooling and mold production and metal part repair. At contract manufacturers such as Incodema3D, AM plays a central role in parts production, and automation further enhances throughput.
EOS (IMTS booth #338450) Smart Monitoring software combines real-time process monitoring with automated process correction, enabling data-driven, closed-loop additive manufacturing.
The convergent manufacturing platform featured in AMT’s Emerging Technology Center (ETC) at IMTS 2024.
3. Abrasive Machining / Sawing / Finishing
Acme Manufacturing’s (IMTS booth #237030) field-proven robotic finishing and polishing (RFP) series transforms how custom knee implants are completed, combining advanced scanning, adaptive path generation, real-time compensation, and multistep abrasive polishing to create smoother, longer-lasting components.
The RFP series also integrates robots from FANUC Corp. (IMTS booth #338900), tool changers from ATI Industrial Automation (IMTS booth #236144), and workholding from Schunk Inc. (IMTS booth #432010).
4. Fabricating & Lasers
Automation benefits from parts identification. Many shops need to mark parts with tracking information to meet industry-specific traceability standards or to maintain internal transparency. IMTS exhibitors such as Monode Marking Products (IMTS booth #135434), FOBA Laser Marking + Engraving (IMTS booth #135436), and Laser Marking Technologies (IMTS booth #135402) all provide machines that can automatically etch serial numbers or QR codes onto a part in seconds. When automated, they can accomplish this, ensuring every piece is labeled for full traceability with minimal operator oversight – and some laser markers can even do so as parts pass on a conveyor.
5. Gear Generation
Exhibitors such as Liebherr Gear and Automation Technologies (IMTS booth #237044) will demonstrate how to digitize gear generation. Through its LHMachineInfo app, users can access machine dashboards to visualize data, machine status, machining results, process logging, manufacturing analysis, production status, and production optimization. Liebherr’s automation solutions also include a portfolio of robot vision applications for part inspection and bin picking.
Gleason’s (IMTS booth #236909) closed-loop metrology systems ensure the direct transmission of measured data from the metrology system to the production machine with manually prompted or autocorrective feedback.
6. Components / Cleaning / Environmental
IMTS reporters gathered examples covering the spectrum of processes, including deburring, cleaning, polishing, and marking.
Even traditional products such as the Easy Arm floor-mounted crane from Gorbel (IMTS booth #135784) now incorporate electric servo motors and sensors that actively assist and stabilize the load while the operator guides it by hand. Instead of the operator supplying all the force (and fighting inertia, sway, and friction), the crane’s control system detects operator intent and provides controlled motion.
When Tavis Vaughn, vice president of engineering at CNC Machine Products, needed a lifting solution to serve three Mazak CNCs, he remembered seeing the Gorbel Easy Arm crane at IMTS.
7. Metal Removal
Exhibitors will showcase automated solutions for spindle machines that enable longer unattended runtimes and increased efficiency in high-mix, low-volume applications.
One shop taking advantage of technology at IMTS is Marathon Precision, a 60,000-square-foot machine shop that purchased a Matsuura (IMTS booth #338630) MAM72-52V 5-axis CNC and a Haas (IMTS booth #338100), both with pallet feed systems.
“You can’t go anywhere else and see as much technology as you can at IMTS. For the week of the show, IMTS is the largest, most advanced shop in the world,” says Marathon Precision owner Michael Bauer. “If you buy technology before anybody else and get good at it, chances are you can win new business.”
8. Quality Assurance
Zeiss (IMTS booth #134302) Inspect software automates recurring inspection tasks, such as alignment, feature creation, GD&T evaluation, and reporting, using project templates and parametric workflows, allowing inspection plans to update automatically as part geometries or requirements change. Hexagon’s (IMTS booth #134102) Metrology Mentor is a new software-as-a-service application that automates the creation of CMM measurement programs.
9. Software
Catamount Machine Works upgraded an existing Mitutoyo (IMTS booth #134117) CMM with Verisurf Software (IMTS booth #134330, a provider of model-based inspection and measurement software, and High QA (IMTS booth #134500), a company that offers ballooning and quality management software. High QA shortened document preparation time by about 80% and is the company’s highest ROI project in the last five years.
10. Tooling & Workholding
After presetting and balancing, zidCode technology from Zoller (IMTS booth #432018) links all data to a QR code on the tool. At the CNC, the operator scans the QR code, which automatically imports all setup and other data into the machine, saving time and eliminating data entry errors.
“Good shops can machine, but great shops can manage tools,” says Max Egan, CEO of Atlas Fibre, a thermoset composite leader that grew its revenue 500% in five years.
After presetting and balancing, zidCode technology from Zoller links all data to a QR code on the tool. Recognizing Atlas Fibre’s efficiency and quality achievements, Zoller awarded Atlas Fibre with its Tool Room of the Year Award, which was announced at IMTS 2024.
Job Satisfaction
Atlas Fibre exemplifies how companies can achieve the impossible and strengthen U.S. manufacturing by combining technology with visionary leadership and dynamic change. Just as important, increased automation is helping make manufacturing more attractive to the next generation of workers – strengthening the industry’s long-term foundation.
Ultimately, the opportunity is clear: Automation is no longer confined to individual processes. It is transforming entire workflows and business models. IMTS 2026 brings that transformation into focus, offering manufacturers a chance to see these technologies in action, connect with solution providers, and identify the next steps to turn strategy into results.
To read the rest of the State of Automation Issue of MT Magazine, click here.
