This story was co-authored in partnership with Technical.ly.

Omaha and Pittsburgh, despite being 1,000 miles apart and having different economic engines, are facing many of the same challenges, including workforce shortages and slowing regional growth.

Each region received federal Build Back Better funding from the Biden administration to turn that around. 

The grants provide “an opportunity to introduce changes and inject new opportunities into systems, programs and organizations,” said Benjamin Pratt, senior VP of business investment at the Allegheny Conference on Community Development. 

Both regions are taking a similar approach, even though Nebraska’s industry prowess is in agriculture versus Pittsburgh’s strength in manufacturing. The Nebraska Heartland Robotics Cluster and Southwestern Pennsylvania’s New Economy Collaborative focus on three main routes to improving automation efforts: education, infrastructure and startup support. 

Three years in, each region is ready to share what it’s learned so far, from helping launch new companies to strengthening decades-old firms.

Labor shortages and talent gaps inspire regions to lean into robotics

Nebraska’s robotics strategy gained national traction in 2022 when the US Department of Commerce awarded $25 million to support the development of the Heartland Robotics Cluster. The grant was part of the Build Back Better Regional Challenge, a federal initiative designed to boost innovation and economic recovery in underserved areas. 

The funding provided an opportunity for Nebraska to formalize and expand an emerging robotics ecosystem centered on agriculture and manufacturing.

“We were already doing some things around agtech,” said Invest Nebraska CEO Dan Hoffman, a key figure in shaping the state’s robotics initiative. “And what we were starting to see was the first few companies … were tech, but they [were] all robotics companies.”

Hoffman pointed to Birds Eye, which was developing a robotics solution for labor challenges in poultry barns and Grain Weevil, which focused on grain bin safety. Virtual Incision was working on surgical robotics and Capstone Technologies was building robotic solutions for the mail industry.

“It was the ‘aha moment’ that we had,” said Hoffman. “Wow, there’s a lot going on around automation and robotics.”

While these companies were working in different sectors, the thread connecting them was their use of robotics to address labor shortages and workforce gaps. “Robotics is going to be a big, big issue for the world going forward,” said Hoffman.

Hoffman believes that if Nebraska doesn’t invest in developing robotics locally, it risks falling behind. “Do we want to be the ones to develop those solutions here in Nebraska?” he said. “Because otherwise we’re just going to be adopting somebody else’s solutions that have been developed in another state or another country.”

He sees Nebraska’s strength in knowing its workforce challenges. “Let’s start developing [solutions] in the state,” he said.

For Pittsburgh, the grants built on its manufacturing roots and strong robotics presence. From 2017 to 2022, corporate investors and VCs have invested $4.3 billion into robotics companies, plus about $163 million from the federal government between 2015 and 2020.

Like Nebraska, Pittsburgh knew its challenges already — largely workforce related — and used the $62.7 million poured into the region from the Build Back Better regional challenge to face them directly. 

The New Economy Collaborative of Southwestern PA (NEC) targets 11 counties in the region, reaching beyond just Allegheny, with the goal of future-proofing the manufacturing and robotics industry by upskilling locals in automation and other emerging skills to build a sustainable workforce pipeline. 

“We saw a really great chance to marry what’s happening with our technologists and roboticists with the manufacturers who are looking for a path forward,” said Stefani Pashman, CEO of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development and the co-chair of the collaborative, “to try to understand how they adopt and adapt and how they can train a workforce for the future.”

More than 90 organizations came together across five NEC projects, led by some of the most influential stakeholders in the region: Catalyst Connection, the Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing Institute, Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission, Innovation Works and InnovatePGH.

Reaching across the region to get those stakeholders together is what has made the project successful so far, according to Pratt.

“While dramatic change and progress [have] been made to date, don’t forget that major changes and results will take time to be fully realized,” Pratt said, “and have faith on core intent of the coalition-based efforts; the work is strong as long as the coalition remains strong.”

Partnerships with local schools are the beginning of the pipeline

For both NEC and the Heartland Robotics Cluster, progress toward a resilient economy in their respective sectors starts with training the workforce. 

“With 17 new workforce training programs ranging from pre-apprenticeships to master’s degree programming,” Pratt said, “we view the role of building a robust talent pipeline to support the growth of automation and the robotics and deep tech economy of Greater Pittsburgh as foundational.”

While working with big local names like Carnegie Mellon University, NEC’s five projects also target smaller colleges in the region. It operates programs at Westmoreland County Community College, Butler County Community College and Robert Morris University.

The efforts range widely, often with the goal of helping communities historically excluded from manufacturing break into the field, like Katie Lynn, who says she’s still the only woman in many of her classes, but nonetheless is excelling in the field. Other schools offer tuition at a fraction of the price, provide free, hands-on training that results in real jobs or even pay students for their time while they learn new skills.

At the University of Nebraska–Lincoln (UNL), the College of Engineering is expanding its robotics curriculum and constructing new research and development lab space for hands-on research and prototyping. The Nebraska Innovation Studio, located at the Nebraska Innovation Campus, is expanding its robotics makerspace to accommodate advanced equipment and increase public access.

Northeast Community College is utilizing part of the grant to establish an automation fabrication lab that will serve both students and manufacturers. Metropolitan Community College is introducing robotics training and outreach in urban agriculture, with a focus on serving underrepresented communities.

According to a 2024 impact report published by the cluster, over 2,000 students have participated in robotics-related programs at partner institutions, including UNL, Metropolitan Community College and Northeast Community College. New facilities and labs are either completed or under construction, providing students and companies with access to the types of resources typically found in larger innovation hubs. At Nebraska Innovation Studio, expanded robotics tools and prototyping stations have already begun drawing in new users and collaborators from across the state.

A strong workforce and cohort of founders with new ideas

All together, the educational efforts build a pipeline that feeds directly into supporting local companies to find workers who can support their automation efforts. 

Decades-old Penna Flame in Pittsburgh, for example, used its NEC support to reduce manual labor and, therefore, cut back on workplace injuries. 

“Access to this talent pipeline continues to be a top priority across all segments,” Pratt said.

Similarly, in Nebraska, the Manufacturing Extension Partnership will lead efforts to introduce automation and robotics to small- and mid-sized manufacturers across the state. 

Both regions have strong startup support, too. The Combine, a startup support program led by Invest Nebraska, will increase its technical assistance for agtech startups deploying robotic solutions in fields and food systems. 

Startups supported by the Combine are progressing through early-stage development, with several agtech robotics ventures now piloting their technologies in real-world environments. These include tools for grain bin safety, poultry barn automation and feed monitoring — each designed to solve persistent labor challenges in agriculture. New ventures with NEC support in Pittsburgh include a new approach to vinyl record manufacturing, a safer way to transport luggage at the airport and turning plastic waste into useful infrastructure.

Beyond startups, the efforts have helped bridge gaps between sectors, creating stronger connections among universities, community colleges, private companies and economic development agencies — an essential part of keeping the regions competitive in a national race toward automation, the Heartland Robotics Cluster said.

No one group can do it alone

Both Nebraska and Southwestern Pennsylvania are using federal investment to build long-term capacity in robotics, targeting gaps in labor, training and commercialization.

In Nebraska, the focus is on supporting agtech and manufacturing sectors through applied research, workforce development and startup assistance. In Pennsylvania, the emphasis is on accelerating advanced robotics through partnerships with universities and industry.

For other ecosystems considering similar initiatives, the programs highlight the importance of coordination across education, government and private sectors to meet workforce and technology goals.

As more regions look to reap the economic benefits of automation, NEC and the Heartland Robotics Cluster show it’ll take a wide swath of partners to get there. While there is still overlap on how to uplift the ecosystem as a whole, understanding and addressing the differences build the next generation of robotics and automation, according to Pratt.  

“Many hands … have played a role [in] making Greater Pittsburgh the destination to build and scale and robust robotics and technology,” Pratt said, “while derisking adoption of these next generation technologies that advance our other core industry clusters.

Ben Goeser contributed to this story.