AI with Presence: The Choreography of Shared Space
Robots are starting to move through our shared spaces: city streets, stores, hotels, hospitals, and airports. As robots enter public and personal spaces, design suddenly matters in a new way. Human spaces carry mood, personality, social awareness, and the small cues that help us understand how to be together. What makes AI feel helpful instead of uncomfortable? Natural instead of disruptive? This event explores the emerging rules of human-robot coexistence.
📍 Date & Time: Tuesday, October 13, 2026 | 6:00 - 8:00 PM (Doors Open at 5:30PM)
Run of Show
5:30 PM - Doors Open | Welcome Drinks
6:00 PM - Programming Begins
6:30 PM - Panel and Q&A
7:15 PM - Networking
8:00 PM - Event Ends
Doors open at 5:30pm and no earlier.
Please bring your ID to enter the building.
Limited seating - Early registration is recommended!
You must register on Luma to attend.
Panelists
Inna Lobel - Head of frog Physical, frog
Inna is a design and innovation leader focused on shaping next-generation products and experiences. She leads Physical at frog across North America, shaping products, systems, and experiences from early concept through to launch.
Her work turns new and emerging technologies into products people want and value, with a growing emphasis on robotics and physical AI. She has partnered with organizations from pre-seed startups to Fortune 50 companies, framing opportunities and shaping products from early stages through launch.
Before joining frog, Inna was a senior member of the product design team at Apple, working on early-stage concepts and bringing products to market. She is an inventor on multiple patents, holds graduate degrees from the MIT Media Lab, is a recipient of the 2022 Women in Innovation Rising Star Award, and teaches entrepreneurship and human-centered design at NYU.
Josh Merel - Director of Applied Science and Co-Founder, Fauna Robotics
Josh Merel is Director of Applied Science at Fauna Robotics, an Amazon company he co-founded as CTO. He leads the company’s technical vision and development of intelligent, human-compatible robotic systems. His work focuses on creating safe, adaptive robots that seamlessly integrate into everyday environments, advancing the frontier of embodied AI.
Before founding Fauna Robotics, Josh spent over a decade in AI and neuroscience research. As a Research Scientist and Manager at Meta’s CTRL-Labs, he helped develop noninvasive neuromotor interfaces that translate neural activity into machine control. Prior to that, he was a Staff Research Scientist at Google DeepMind, where he contributed to pioneering work in machine learning and motor control applied to robotics, bridging insights from neuroscience and artificial intelligence.
Josh holds a Ph.D. in Neurobiology and Behavior from Columbia University, where his research explored the computational principles underlying motor learning and neural adaptation. He earned his B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania in the Biological Basis of Behavior program, with a minor in Electrical Engineering.
Wendy Ju- Professor of Information Science and Design Tech, Cornell Tech
Wendy Ju is a Professor of Information Science and Design Tech at Cornell Tech. Professor Ju helped to found Cornell’s new multi-college Design Tech department. Her research in the areas of human-robot interaction and interactive system design highlights the ways that interactive devices can be designed to be safer, more predictable, and more socially appropriate. Current research interests include elicitation of cross-cultural behavioral differences in driver and pedestrian interaction, and multi-robot multi-person interaction with robots in public settings.
Professor Ju has innovated numerous methods for early-stage prototyping of automated systems to understand how people will respond to systems before the systems are built. She has over 100 publications in the areas of interaction design, human-robot interaction, and human-machine interaction; her research has had widespread impact on the way that systems are designed and tested in robotics and the automotive industry. This research has been featured in The New York Times, The Economist, BBC, CNN, WIRED, The Atlantic, Financial Times, Washington Post, and NPR. Ju was inducted into the ACM SIGCHI Academy in 2025. Ju has a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University and a Master’s degree in Media Arts and Sciences from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Hosted by Capgemini Applied Innovation Exchange and frog, in partnership with NY Robotics.
Capgemini Applied Innovation Exchange
Capgemini’s Applied Innovation Exchange (AIE) is Capgemini's global platform for innovation. It brings together a framework for action, a network of exchanges, and a rich and diverse ecosystem of experts, startups, alliance partners, and Capgemini’s own capabilities, to deliver the pinnacle innovation engagement experience.
frog
frog, part of Capgemini Invent, is a leading global creative consultancy, part of Capgemini Invent. We partner with passionate leaders and visionary entrepreneurs to imagine and build experiences, products, and businesses across physical and digital that disrupt the status quo, win hearts, and realize the future.
New York Robotics
New York Robotics (NYR) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing the robotics and embodied AI industry across regional, national, and global landscapes. What began as a grassroots meetup - uniting a fragmented community across the New York Metropolitan area - has rapidly evolved into a driving force for innovation, investment, and industry growth. Through their work convening founders, industry leaders, researchers, and institutions, NYR has established itself as a driving force for innovation, investment, and industry growth, helping position New York as a premier global hub for robotics.