Amy Katsigiannis, BTC & Special Projects Coordinator, and John Coyle, VP of Sales, recap the 2026 Business Tech Conference. They highlight the event’s focus on client collaboration, from panel discussions and ADD User Group meetings to partners showcased in the Exhibitor Hall. The conversation also explores major product announcements, including Raven for Android and ADD Atlas Intelligence™.
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Brian Cohen: Welcome to ADDcast. I’m Brian Cohen, Multimedia Specialist here at ADD Systems. Today, we’re catching up on everything that took place at the 2026 Business Tech Conference with Amy Katsigiannis, BTC and Special Projects Coordinator, and John Coyle, VP of Sales at ADD Systems. Amy and John, thank you both for joining me today.
Amy Katsigiannis: Thanks, Brian.
John Coyle: Happy to be here, Brian.
Brian: Amy, let’s start with you. We’re one month past the BTC, and I know it’s fresh in all of our minds, but for someone who’s listening who may have never attended the BTC, can you maybe talk about what that experience is?
Amy: Yeah. Our BTC is our Business Tech Conference. It’s a week-long event where you bring together ADD users, partners, and ADD employees to learn together, collaborate, and connect. We offer three full days of sessions. We also offer some exciting evening events where people get to continue their networking experience.
Brian: So, John, bringing you into the conversation and bouncing off that, what makes the BTC different than other industry conferences?
John: That’s a great question, Brian. I think first and foremost, the BTC is all about ADD Systems and our connection to our customers. Our average tenure of clients is over 20 years, so we’re seeing people that come to BTCs year after year, but we also see a lot of new people, and our ability to connect those users with other users from around the country, or really around the globe, has been one of the strengths of the BTC. I think the other thing that makes it unique compared to other events that we attend, and as a company, we attend over 30 events a year within the industry – this one is really about driving family and the connection of family and that bond. So, we encourage our attendees to bring their families, and we make all of our evening events open to the family groups. We get to see the kids throughout the day, spouses, partners. It’s really that type of connection, and that bringing everyone together is just what makes it special. But then, when we look at the content that we cover over that three, four-day period, is really focused on how our users are using this software, where they want to see it go, where we envision in our newest enhancements that we talk about, which are things that our customers have been asking for, and really trying to drive the product forward, so that it meets the needs of our customers, not just today, but in the future. So, I think the thing that really makes the BTC different again is the connection that you have with people. And again, it’s not just client customer to ADD Systems, but really a true connection driving what do these products need to do together, because the clients will certainly ask questions and want the products to do something, but when we’re face to face and we’re working through challenges or problems or just ideas with a group of customers, you get to hear perspective in a lot of different ways, and so what one client on the East Coast thinks is, you know, the only way to do it, they hear from a West Coast client who does it completely different, and all of a sudden, the lights go on, and they’re like, “Wow, I never even thought of that.” Yet, those features existed in the system, so that connection and the collaboration make their businesses better, and ultimately make our businesses better by connecting those customers and allowing us to deliver for them on day to day.
Brian: Now, I know I mentioned both of your titles during the introduction here, but I don’t think that quite gives the answer to what goes on behind the scenes. So, I’d like to kind of break the fourth wall a little bit. And, Amy, starting with you, can you talk a little bit about what your role was being involved in the 2026 BTC?
Amy: Absolutely. So I am the BTC and Special Projects Coordinator. So I was involved in a lot of the planning and coordinating of the BTC. I managed attendee registration, coordinated conference communication, worked with sponsors and exhibitors to help us support the conference, and I also assisted in the BTC programming and overall event execution.
Brian: And, John, same question to you.
John: Well, I first say, I think Amy is very modest in her description of her BTC role. This is a full year plus planning event in order to put this on, and Amy has been instrumental in really bringing all that together with so many moving parts that we have to work through to make a successful event. And my role in the BTC is a little bit of everything. So I’m involved in that year out from planning and working and figuring out what type of sessions we want to have, working with our clients to try and get them onto panels, because we find panel discussions are really a huge part of the BTC. Working with the partners, we had over 20 partners attend our event, and those are partners that we work with that our clients are working with on a day to day. We’re trying to do more with those partners and better integrations with other systems out there, so that’s another factor that I’m involved with on the BTC. And then working with clients, making sure clients are coming to the BTC, getting that information out to them in advance, and reminding owners, you know, you need to send more than one person. This is really somebody from every department should be coming to an event like this, because they all have something to gain from it. So, yeah, it’s a little bit of everything, but ultimately, we all work really hard. There’s a full team behind it, putting on an event like this, and we’re just two of the lucky people who get to be part of it.
Brian: Now, Amy, diving deeper into the planning of the BTC, what are some of the biggest priorities and goals for the event, and what would you say you’re most excited about as we enter each and every BTC?
Amy: Oh, that’s a good question, Brian. I think our goal for every BTC is client interaction. We want people to have face-to-face conversations. We want people to be involved, so we really push the collaboration theme. I would also say family is something we have always prioritized, but I think each BTC, it’s grown in attendance and kind of having that connected community.
John: Yeah, if I could just jump in there, too, Brian. I think Amy really hit the nail on the head, and a lot of us, unfortunately, tend to be a little bit of a workaholic; I know I certainly am. So, being at an event like the BTC, where we’re bringing our families along, it really is an acknowledgement to say, hey, you know what, we work hard, but we want to play hard, and we want to make sure that our families that we’re out there supporting are part of this event, because they are allowing us to come to work every day and do the things that we do, and we couldn’t do it without them. So that family connection within the event, and making sure our clients become connected with each other. I really love seeing clients from different sides of the country or different markets that have connected through an ADD event over the years, that then become go-to people they talk to about questions they have about their business. They’re not competitors, but yet they’re in the same industry, so they’re willing to share and grow, and those connections that we get in that BTC event from the live face-to-face meetings that we have, they extend well beyond the event, and I think it’s that combination that really makes it unique and special.
Brian: Well, I’m hearing a lot about the conference and the networking and the family aspects, but I’m sure someone listening is probably thinking to themselves, what about the software? So, John, what were some of the key product announcements that were made at the BTC?
John: Oh, yeah, wow, this year’s BTC, we certainly had a lot. So, our mobile product has been an industry-leading class product for a number of years; that’s our Raven mobile delivery product. That we announced this year will be available on an Android platform to go along with our Windows platform. So, the dual platform strategy allows us to have a little bit of everything. So, some clients are really focused, and they love Android, and other clients have been really strong with Windows. Now, we’ve got one for both. With that announcement, we were able to add new features to the product, and so we’re always looking to do that and advance the product. When we talk about new features, ADD Energy E360. This is a product that we’ve been developing and putting into the market for the last couple of years, and with this BTC, we announced even more features and functionality, adding to that product, making it a stronger solution for our customers. An easier solution, a more customizable solution, and the number of new features we added is almost astronomical compared to where we were three years ago with this product. And more of our customers were so excited to see what we could do today with the latest features. So that means we’ve got a lot of upgrades scheduled as people want to take advantage of that. The upgrade list and the new products continued with our Atlas business intelligence product. That product has been around for a number of years. That product continues to grow within our client base as we have more and more data available within the systems and the partners that we work with. Atlas allows us to look at that data and scrub that data, and create reports that are meaningful and timely. So it’s been a subscription-based reporting system, where you design a report, and it shows up in your inbox every day at, say, 6 o’clock in the morning, but it’s also an exception-based reporting system, which allows you to tell the system, hey, as long as it’s within this criteria, I’m okay, but when it’s out of the criteria, I want to know about that problem. And so, it brings problems to light and allows me to focus on the things that are right at hand. Well, we’ve had that product for a number of years, and it’s extremely popular with our client base. Now we’re adding business intelligence to that product with AI, so we’re really rebranding the product to be ADD AI, and we’ve connected that product with Microsoft business intelligence through its Power BI and Copilot functionality, so now we’re leveraging true AI technology that’s available within the marketplace today in a secure way, so the data of our customers stay safe, but they can leverage the power of AI within an ADD product. And this is really the first instance that we’re able to do this. It was one that made a lot of sense for us, but it’s one that we see is a lot of development going forward, and we’re going to continue to see that AI addition work its way into really all the ADD products into the future I would assume someday.
Brian: Now, sticking with the sessions, Amy, I want to bring you back into the conversation here. Having been to multiple BTCs myself now, one thing I noticed in 2026, there were a lot of panel discussions versus years past. Can you talk about some of those?
Amy: Yeah, absolutely. We added more panel discussions because it gives a lot of real-world experience to the session. People want to hear from their peers, not just our ADD employees. Encouraging the panel discussions encourages the theme of collaboration. Hearing people talk about real-world experiences with our products will only benefit the users. There are clients who use the product in different ways, so by having people share their experiences, it can really open up conversations and new opportunities for our clients.
John: Amy, I think you’re 100% right. I mean, we’ve always said at ADD Systems, our clients all use the product a little bit differently. And when I get to see a session like the SmartConnect session that we had, where we had six clients on the stage, and we had people from the audience also talking about the things that they wanted to do, we got to hear about the same ADD tool and how it was used in so many different ways, and to watch the ideas and the conversations that happened thereafter, clients are saying, “Wow, I never thought of that.” And to hear that, “I never thought of that,” it brings something that they’re going to take home, that they’re going to be able to do more with our software. So we’re excited about that.
Brian: And I have to say, I was fortunate enough to have sat in several of those panel discussions, and one thing I noticed is a lot of the people that were speaking were extremely passionate about their use of the software and what it meant to them as a company, and when I think about passionate users of the software, my mind kind of goes immediately to the ADD User Group (AUG), which, again, in 2026, had so much activity happening at the conference, so I’d like to ask each of you, maybe Amy, we’ll start with you, how did the ADD User Group activity increase in 2026 compared to prior years?
Amy: First, I would say that the ADD User Group is really the voice in helping to shape our product direction for the future. So I think having them present at our conferences is always very impactful. I think getting involved in the ADD User Group, making connections there. Just going off of what John was just saying with the customer panels, it’s even more of that engagement. It’s a lot of peer-to-peer learning, it helps with our design discussions, they can help with our enhancement process. I think being a part of the ADD User Group also encourages year-round networking. Our BTC is the catalyst for more conversation, more discussion, so getting involved with the ADD User Group just continues those conversations beyond the BTC.
John: Oh, you hit the nail on the head, Amy. I think what I always loved about the ADD User Group is that it’s not a group that we run. We facilitate, we help out, but it’s an independent group of ADD users that forms this. They have their own bylaws, they manage it, so to see as many people get excited about that user group, and we see massive growth in the AUG post-BTC with the number of clients that signed up at the event, and even after the event. People who didn’t make it to the conference, well, those who did went home to the company and said, hey, you need to join this. We talked to a lot of people, and they said, you know, these people from this department, their dispatchers are attending the Raven Committee, their operations team is attending this committee. That connection and bringing more clients from the customers who couldn’t make it to the BTC into the ADD User Group just further enhances the strength of that organization, and those additional people that join every year are bringing new ideas to the table, and they’re bringing new connections and ultimately new businesses as we continue to sign on new clients, so there’s an activity there that, as Amy said, continues well beyond the BTC. In fact, our post-monthly meetings in the various committees that are a part of the ADD User Group have been tremendous this last month. So we’re a month out and we’ve already had a number of meetings, and there’s some of the highest attended and the new people that are coming in. There are people that just listen, there are people that are very involved, but whatever your level of involvement that you’re comfortable with, there’s a place for you in the ADD User Group, and that’s really important for it. So, ADD Systems really couldn’t exist today without the ADD User Group, because it helps tell us what our clients are thinking, give us guidance on where they want us to go. You know, we don’t sit in a vacuum, and we just make this stuff up as we go. We’re designing software to fit the needs of our clients, both today and tomorrow, and so it’s that connection and that discussion that we get to have, and the feedback that we get from a group like the ADD User Group, the AUG. It’s really instrumental in our success.
Brian: So, John, I want to stick with you for a second. Having gone through the Exhibitor Hall and had a chance to sit down and speak with a lot of the ADD Systems partners, I’d like to turn the discussion to that for a minute. How do you feel partners contribute to the overall value of the BTC, and did clients discover any new tools, integrations, or solutions in the hall?
John: First, I’d say we couldn’t put on a BTC without our partners. ADD partnerships that we have, the companies that our clients are working with that are leveraging the tools within our software, it’s extremely important to ADD Systems, and those people that attend as partners, they attend the Exhibit Hall, they get to meet with our clients, they get to mingle and meet with a lot of their customers, but also potential new customers, and they do share ideas and opportunities to enhance those companies’ businesses. I think each partner that we work with brings something unique to the table, and that’s why our clients have found them as good-valued partnerships for them and their companies, whether they be a payments company, whether they be an online portal company. We had partners on the hardware side, like Panasonic and Brother; they were there. Unitech was there with showing their latest technology and hardware. So it’s a combination of software, hardware, and services that come to that event, and they’re all things that are needed by our clients to run a successful business, things that ADD necessarily doesn’t offer that specific function, but through partnerships, the client is able to offer a complete solution to their clients, and that’s really what’s most important. So, again, we couldn’t do it without them. It’s extremely important that they’re there, but our clients do get a lot from having those meetings. In fact, every BTC, we have some new partners who show. Typically, with every BTC, we get the same ones that come, because once they’ve come, they always want to come. But bringing new partners into the event allows us to create and show new solutions, things that didn’t exist maybe three years ago. And that Exhibit Hall was pretty busy during that event. In fact, many partners that I talked to after the event were just thrilled. They said, “When do we sign up for the next one? How can we be more involved?” Some of the newer partners were stunned. They didn’t know what to expect. They go to a lot of conferences like we do, and yet this is a unique conference, and they were stunned by the level of connection that they were able to have with our clients. So, it’s just something that the partners absolutely love to attend, and I think our clients ultimately get a lot out of those partners that come to the event.
Brian: Well, Amy, being one of the driving forces behind the BTC, I kind of want to do a Wizard of Oz moment here and peel the curtain back a little bit. What goes into making the BTC successful behind the scenes?
Amy: That is a very good question, Brian. The BTC is only held once every three years because it requires a ton of preparation. With all of the preparation that goes into it, that also requires a ton of teamwork on our end. We have a very strong focus on our attendee experience, so that means a lot of detailed planning and coordination. We put a lot of thought into this conference, and thankfully, we have an amazing team at ADD Systems that everyone here wants the next BTC to be even more successful than the last.
Brian: Well, then, following up on that, and I think I want to ask you both this question: was there a moment during the 2026 BTC that you felt really captured the spirit of the event overall?
Amy: I would say something that captured the spirit of the BTC is probably the amount of collaboration we got to see at this event. Every time the collaboration is greater than the last time. We got to see customers, partners, and our ADD team all come together and share knowledge. That was evident in more panel discussions, the engagement from our AUG, and even our evening networking. There was a really exciting sense of community at all of our events.
John: Building on what Amy said, I think if I really want to say what captured the spirit, the AUG meeting that was held live at the event was unlike any other, and I’ve been in many BTCs already. Each BTC, we try to choose something new, and we try to bring something different to the table for our audience, and yet, it’s the BTC collaboration, as Amy said, is really the thing that makes it stand out. The AUG was a true spirit of that moment. I think the number of partner sessions that we had, and the partner sessions were very well attended. And then, lastly, the panel discussions that we had were extremely well attended, and I again feel that a lot of our clients that I spoke to got a lot out of those by hearing what other companies were doing. And then, you know, the nighttime events that we put on really showcased that family aspect of the BTC, which is something we really work hard at bringing together, something that you don’t see at any other conference in this industry.
Brian: And I think that was evident when I dug through the Whova app and saw the photos from Galaxy’s Edge, so I guess I’d be remiss to not bring that up. What were your thoughts on Galaxy’s Edge?
John: Well, I think Galaxy’s Edge at Disney was an incredible opportunity for ADD Systems to just do something a little bit different. Three years ago, we got to go to another world. We visited the world of Pandora, and our clients just loved it. They just had such a blast. So, it was a very unique experience, something we hadn’t done in the past. And so, for this BTC, we wanted to take it up a notch. So, we had been to another world; now we needed to go to a galaxy far, far away. And the Star Wars event was truly a hit. We had people showing up, really bringing certain family members just in for that event, because they were so excited about it, but I got to ride a couple of rides with clients. I got to ride it with one of our own people, who, as a super Star Wars fan, and to see the joy on a 50-year-old man’s face as he’s riding a Star Wars ride that he’s not ridden before, honestly, it touched me a little bit. It touched me a little deeply, but the opportunity to connect with clients at an event like that, it’s just really unique, and it’s something that only ADD Systems brings to this industry.
Brian: I was definitely one of those near 50 people who had a little bit of a tear in their eye as I got to hop onto the Millennium Falcon for the first time. Amy, was your feedback similar to John’s in terms of Galaxy’s Edge?
Amy: I heard nothing but amazing things, and I think when you host an event in Disney, you can’t really go wrong. Everything they do is magical, and I think that just kind of reiterates our family aspect of the event. So, I think it was a great night, and I’m sure 2029 will have something even more amazing to offer.
Brian: And, John, I want to dive into something else here. Two BTCs ago, we had to go virtual because of COVID in 2020, and in 2023 was the first in-person one we had had since 2017. Why do you think bringing everyone together in person still matters?
John: I think it matters a lot. I think we learned, you know, certainly through COVID, we can get on a Zoom, we can see each other’s faces if people turn their cameras on, you know, we can have some connection, but there’s nothing like bringing people together. Having multiple people in a conversation where you’re not necessarily waiting for the next person to talk, because you have to pause for the monitor and the microphone to catch up. Now you’re able to talk over somebody and jump in the middle of a conversation. There’s nothing like bringing people together, and that’s really what the BTC is all about. It’s all about community. If I were going to sum it up into one word, it’s community, and it’s the ADD Systems community, but it’s truly a community of our clients, our customers, and our employees. And you have to bring people face-to-face to be able to have that type of connection. You can’t do it over the screen, you can’t do it over the phone. Those are all tools that we’re using on a day-to-day basis, and they’re important tools that allow us to run our businesses. But an event like this, bringing everybody together in person matters, and it’s just something we’re passionate about. And so I really see a future of BTCs happening for a long, long time, where we really strive to make them bigger and better every three years, but it’s bringing people together, you get that connection, the community, and there’s no other way to do it. So it’s just so important to what we do.
Amy: I was going to add on to that, John, and just say that I had such a nice experience getting to meet clients face-to-face that I had been communicating with over the last year or more, planning for the BTC, getting to put a face to a name for me, and then a human connection with them. I really enjoyed that opportunity.
Brian: Well, Amy, I’ve already heard rumblings about a 2029 BTC being in the works. Is there any news you’d like to share on that?
Amy: Right now, our plan is for a 2029 BTC. We are wrapping up our 2026 BTC, but are already headed right into the planning for the next one. Three years goes much faster than you’d like to think, so we have to get right on it and keep moving the ball forward.
Brian: So, John, what innovations are you personally most excited about coming out of this year’s conference?
John: The innovations I say I’m most excited about are our Raven Android product, our ADD E360 browser-based solution; that’s an evolutionary product. It’s something that continues to grow each year, but the number of features we put into that this year, like a wholesale dispatch, which is all new, and extremely well received by the clients at the conference. People are just already getting online to get it installed as soon as possible. Those are some of the biggest ones I think that I’m really excited about, but there were discussions about things that we’ll be talking about at the 29 BTC already, and those innovations and the work that’s going to be done over the next couple of years to bring that next level of things is also something I get really excited about. Ideas that we didn’t necessarily have going into the meeting or ideas that we had thoughts on through those collaborations and those discussions with customers, really things start to take shape and really give us a good vision and where we’re headed. So yeah, I’m excited about a lot of things, but innovation in our software, and how it’s going to support our customers and make them more efficient, more profitable, there’s a lot of them.
Brian: Well, the theme of 2026’s BTC was advancing through collaboration. What does that mean to you now that the 2026 BTC is in the rearview mirror?
John: Advancement through collaboration, as we’ve talked about on this entire podcast, is the connection of our clients to each other and to ADD Systems, and we work really hard as a company to continue that collaboration throughout the year, and our non-BTC years. Really, a day-to-day mantra here at ADD Systems, is to connect and work with our clients, and that’s top down, from Bruce Bott, our President, who visits more clients than any other president I think in this industry or any other corporate president that I know. He wants to be in the field working with clients, knowing what their pains and their struggles are, but also how we help in that solution, and that filters down with his lead through every employee in this company. And so the information we get working with clients throughout the year, our trainers bring it back. Our programmers are always listening for the new thing and trying to think of things a little bit differently – how are clients using the thing that they designed in a different way than they ever thought? So that collaboration is just key to everything we do here, and so it was a really nice choice for us to choose that as the mantra for the BTC, but it’s something that we do every day, and it’s something that we’re passionate about, and I think it’s one of the keys to our success.
Brian: Well, Amy and John, this has been an absolute pleasure. Thank you for taking the time to speak with me today.
John: Oh, thank you, Brian.
Amy: Yeah, thank you.
Brian: To keep up with the latest happenings at ADD Systems, visit addsys.com/blog, or connect with us on social media by following ADD Systems on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, or X. If you have any questions about ADDcast, feel free to reach out to us at addcast@addsys.com. Thanks for listening, and have a great day.
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