Last month, leaders from across the North American lift truck industry gathered at the Arizona Biltmore in Phoenix for the Industrial Truck Association’s 2026 Annual Meeting. Matrix Design Group was proud to be part of the conversation.
ITA is a unique room. Its members build the trucks that move goods through nearly every warehouse, plant and distribution center in the U.S., Canada and Mexico. When this group aligns on a direction, the whole market follows. This year, one theme came through clearly: safety technology is no longer an aftermarket add-on. It’s becoming part of how a truck is designed, sold and supported.
Three takeaways from Phoenix
1. Collision avoidance is moving to the factory floor. Fleet operators are asking for pedestrian and object detection that works out of the box, not a retrofit that varies from site to site. OEMs that integrate it at the platform level can offer a more consistent, supportable product.
2. The value goes beyond avoiding accidents. Conversations kept returning to visibility and productivity: fewer near misses, fewer stops, better data on how trucks and people share space. Safety and uptime are increasingly the same discussion.
3. Partnerships beat point solutions. No OEM wants to build every technology in-house. The winning model is a proven technology partner that integrates cleanly and supports the dealer network after the sale.
A word from our OEM team
“ITA is where the people who build the industry’s trucks sit down together, and this year the conversation felt different. OEMs aren’t asking whether to integrate collision avoidance anymore; they’re asking how fast they can do it without adding complexity for their dealers. That’s exactly where Matrix wants to be: a partner that makes the OEM’s product stronger, not another box to bolt on,” said Karly Broerman, OEM Sales Manager at Matrix Design Group.
What’s next
We left Phoenix with new conversations and a clear sense of where the industry is heading. Thank you to the ITA team for a well-run event and to everyone who took time to meet with us.
If you’re an OEM exploring integrated collision avoidance for your lift truck lineup, let’s continue the conversation.
