Engineering Industry Insights & Trends

engineering.com

Explore the length and breadth of 21st century engineering, from civil engineering megaprojects to innovation at the quantum level. We speak with subject matter experts and industry watchers from every sector of the engineering discipline.

  1. 10/28/2025

    US Workers Ponder the Threat of Robotics

    The march of automation and manufacturing has always been associated with the fear of job loss. The rapid advancement of industrial robotics in the last 20 years has created a cottage industry of speculation over the economic and societal shift caused by a reduced need for workers on the assembly line. US manufacturing workers live in a high wage nation, and are especially vulnerable…do they fear the rise of the machines? The Pittsburgh Robotics Network has just released the results of a new national survey that examines US worker attitudes toward our AI-driven automation revolution, and Executive Director of the organization Jennifer Apicella, joins engineering.com’s Jim Anderton to talk about the apparent mismatch between worker perception and reality.  * * * engineering.com produces a number of video programs for the engineering professional found exclusively on engineering.com TV such as Designing the Future, Manufacturing the Future, and The Engineering Roundtable. Subscribe to our newsletter to stay current with the latest in engineering trends.

    18 min

  2. 10/01/2025

    Italian machine tech and why it endures in uncertain times

    The Trump Administration’s tariff regime has sent shockwaves around the manufacturing world, and has made ”re-shoring" the new word in American manufacturing. Machinery, however, is a global commodity, and some of the highest technology machinery is from European and Asian sources that previously enjoyed an open trading relationship with the US. Dr. Carlo Angelo Bocci is the Italian Trade Agency Trade Commissioner based in Miami and is the Trade Commissioner for Canada. He met with engineering.com’s Jim Anderton at the Canadian Manufacturing Technology Show in Toronto. Dr. Bocci is a trade veteran with experience in Asia, the Americas and Europe, and he discussed the outlook for the Italian machine industry, and that of European machine builders in general. * * * engineering.com produces a number of video programs for the engineering professional found exclusively on engineering.com TV such as Designing the Future, Manufacturing the Future, and The Engineering Roundtable. Subscribe to our newsletter to stay current with the latest in engineering trends.

    16 min

  3. 09/25/2025

    Robots, drones, AGVs: it’s all about navigation

    Self-driving cars, drones, humanoid robots. They are all over the news and popular culture today and are technologies that need a critical capability: navigation. It’s been true for thousands of years, and for most of human history, dead reckoning was a rare skill, and a black art. “Shooting” stars with the sextant is still an option for sport sailors, but today, repeatability and accuracy have never been more important. It’s been a story of rapid technological development for the last 75 years, from the gyro compass, accelerometer driven inertial navigation systems, to stellar tracking, and terrain following. GPS is of course the lowest cost method in widespread use today, but even its significant capability isn't enough for many of today’s demanding applications. Advanced Navigation Senior Application Engineer Matthew Suntup describes the challenges and capabilities of this critical technology in conversation with engineering.com’s Jim Anderton. * * * engineering.com produces a number of video programs for the engineering professional found exclusively on engineering.com TV such as Designing the Future, Manufacturing the Future, and The Engineering Roundtable. Subscribe to our newsletter to stay current with the latest in engineering trends.

    21 min

  4. 09/19/2025

    Drone helicopters with multiple applications

    Drones are everywhere today, from suburban backyards to battlefields. In between these extremes is a huge market for useful pilotless aircraft for remote inspection, payload delivery and remote sensing. SwissDrones is one of a new breed of small aerospace companies that use advanced design and development tools to deliver complex projects quickly and cost effectively. Their medium payload drone helicopter has multiple commercial applications, and Pol-Victor Gisquet, Team Leader, Mechanical Systems Integration with SwissDrones, discussed the technology in conversation with Jim Anderton at AU 2025 in Nashville, Tennessee.   * * * engineering.com produces a number of video programs for the engineering professional found exclusively on engineering.com TV such as Designing the Future, Manufacturing the Future, and The Engineering Roundtable. Subscribe to our newsletter to stay current with the latest in engineering trends.

    17 min

  5. 09/19/2025

    One tool, to make everything?

    Manufacturing engineers call it the “death zone”. Some call it the “scaling conundrum”. Once a design is finalized, and a prototype made, it’s frequently expensive and difficult to create the pilot runs and small volume production that’s essential to test market and validate a new product. It’s far too expensive to tool up for mass production of a part or device based on only a single prototype, but how can an innovator bridge that gap? At AU 2025 in Nashville, Tennessee,  Autodesk Fusion Community Manager Jonathan Odom demonstrated a short run manufacturing platform that allows innovators to program and control multiple production technologies, from multi-axis machine tools to 3D printers, and significantly, to share designs with contract manufacturers that offer both manufacturing capacity and useful design expertise of their own.  Is this the universal tool for making anything and everything? Odom explains all to Jim Anderton. * * * engineering.com produces a number of video programs for the engineering professional found exclusively on engineering.com TV such as Designing the Future, Manufacturing the Future, and The Engineering Roundtable. Subscribe to our newsletter to stay current with the latest in engineering trends.

    20 min

  6. 09/18/2025

    AI powered mass collaboration for engineering

    COVID 19 generated an unprecedented demand for remote work and created a demand for mass collaboration tools that let designers work as unified teams, without a physical presence. For many tasks, it’s relatively simple, but in the architecture, engineering and construction space, substantially different systems, designs and skills must be sequenced correctly to deliver a project on time and on budget.  Effective project management of an already difficult task, along with simultaneous mass collaboration, is highly challenging.  Autodesk Workshop XR Senior Director and General Manager Nikolas Fonta talks to Jim Anderton about how the power of artificial intelligence allows widely dispersed engineering and design teams to work cohesively to deliver projects on time and on budget.  * * * engineering.com produces a number of video programs for the engineering professional found exclusively on engineering.com TV such as Designing the Future, Manufacturing the Future, and The Engineering Roundtable.

    18 min

  7. 09/18/2025

    An AI first: building electrical layout

    Building engineering is a unique form of craft and science, blending multiple materials, processes and design methodologies. Cabling a modern structure means coping with power and signal conductors which must be routed efficiently through complex structures, a 3D puzzle which challenges even the most experienced engineers. Toronto-based Augment is an AI powered generates optimized layouts without tedious and time-consuming at the design level. Augment co-founder Aaron Szymanski discusses this design first with Jim Anderton. * * * engineering.com produces a number of video programs for the engineering professional found exclusively on engineering.com TV such as Designing the Future, Manufacturing the Future, and The Engineering Roundtable.

    16 min

  8. 09/17/2025

    The future of artificial intelligence isn’t what you think

    Few emerging technologies have generated as much interest, research and concern as AI, and in the engineering space, it’s no different. It is now clear that AI represents a tool of unprecedented power to streamline engineering workflows, but at the rapid pace of development, it is quickly evolving into something more. The art and science of engineering is now changing in real time, as agentic AI not only performs the singular design and development tasks, but collaborates with other AI systems in ways which aren’t fully understood by the people using them. It sounds scary, but the actual future is exactly the opposite, according to Autodesk Senior Director of AI Research, Few emerging technologies have generated as much interest, research and concern as AI, and in the engineering space, it’s no different. It is now clear that AI represents a tool of unprecedented power to streamline engineering workflows, but at the rapid pace of development, it is quickly evolving into something more. The art and science of engineering is now changing in real time, as agentic AI not only performs the singular design and development tasks, but collaborates with other AI systems in ways which aren’t fully understood by the people using them. It sounds scary, but the actual future is exactly the opposite, according to Autodesk Senior Director of AI Research, Dr. Tonya Custis. She is a true AI tech insider, and she discusses this important topic in conversation with Jim Anderton.. She is a true AI tech insider, and she discusses this important topic in conversation with Jim Anderton. * * * engineering.com produces a number of video programs for the engineering professional found exclusively on engineering.com TV such as Designing the Future, Manufacturing the Future, and The Engineering Roundtable.

    16 min
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Explore the length and breadth of 21st century engineering, from civil engineering megaprojects to innovation at the quantum level. We speak with subject matter experts and industry watchers from every sector of the engineering discipline.

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