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NexusCon 2026: Call for Abstracts and Emcees is LIVE
Click here to submit an application to present at NexusCon 2026
ā
Click here to submit an application to emcee an educational session at NexusCon 2026
ā
It was 8:30 AM on October 6th, 2025, in Denver, Colorado. We, the Nexus Labs team, stood on stage, facing the bright lights and a room packed with hundreds of commercial building operation professionals ready to close Microsoft Teams for 3 full days and, instead, open their ears and eyes to conversations with real colleagues facing the real challenge of using technology to improve our built environment.
What followed was more than 64 educational presentations, almost all of which given by building owners, on how they are overcoming their day-to-day challenges to increase operational efficiency, save energy, secure systems, and bring us to the modern era of buildings.
NexusCon, for 3 days a year, becomes the world's epicenter of smart building technology learning and knowledge sharing. But it doesn't start when the registration booth opens. It starts today, 8 months earlier, with the request for abstracts.
From today until April 17th, 2026, you have the opportunity to submit your application and lead the conversations that will happen on October 5thā7th in Detroit, Michigan.
We've reviewed everything we did last year, taken feedback, and completed another iteration on NexusCon. Below is everything you need to know about educational sessions at NexusCon 2026 and how to submit an abstract that will get you on stage.
A Note on "Half-Baked" Ideas: Donāt let the fear of a "polished presentation" stop you. If you have a gritty, real-world lesson learned but aren't sure how to frame it yet, submit it anyway. If your insight is right for our community, the Nexus Labs team will roll up our sleeves and work with you to get the content stage-ready. We value raw truth over a perfect slide deck.
Our NexusCon 2026 Session Format: Playbooks & Execution Insights
Each educational session at NexusCon is anchored to a Playbookāa repeatable method for building owners to achieve Connected Building outcomes. Nexus Labs has preselected 33 Connected Buildings Playbooks that will be the focus of 2026. To maximize high-value learning, we are using a specific structure:
- The Context: Nexus Labs and the emcee provide an introduction on the Playbook basics (steps, tech, and metrics).
- The Accelerator: Your role as a presenter is to provide Playbook Accelerators.
Playbook Accelerators are not high-level overviews or victory laps. They are deep dives into the "in-the-weeds" detailsāthe specific places where a process broke down and how you overcame that friction.
This is the biggest change to presentations for NexusCon 2026: We set the context for the Playbook in the introduction, so you don't need to include it in your presentation.
Accelerator Examples:
- Example 1 (The Playbook: Occupancy-Driven Operations): Instead of explaining how someone can use occupancy sensors, a speaker shares the specific data-tagging schema used to converge access control and occupancy sensor data at a hospital. They demonstrate how this unified view enabled them to reallocate 20% of their FM staff from low-traffic zones to critical care areas in real time.
- Example 2 (The Playbook: Condition-Based Maintenance): At NexusCon 2025, LinkedIn shared how their FDD rollout stalled because onsite teams viewed proactive alerts as "extra work". To fix this, they pivoted to a "Fee at Risk" contract model, tying vendor profit directly to FDD-generated KPIs like proactive work order completion and comfort scores.
What Weāre Looking For (And How to Get Accepted):
- NO SALES PITCHES: Focus on peer-to-peer education.
- Specific > General: Donāt present the whole Playbook; present a specific lesson learned within it (aka Playbook Execution Insight).
- Actionable & Technical: Include live dashboards, real statistics, and relevant screenshots.
- Progress over Perfection: We prioritize presentations featuring building owners and real building storiesāeven if the story is still "to be continued."
Each abstract application submission is for one presentation related to one Playbook. You may submit as many applications on as many different presentations as you would like.
ā
Sign up for our Newsletter to never miss an update on NexusCon 2026
Click here to submit an application to present at NexusCon 2026
ā
Click here to submit an application to emcee an educational session at NexusCon 2026
ā
It was 8:30 AM on October 6th, 2025, in Denver, Colorado. We, the Nexus Labs team, stood on stage, facing the bright lights and a room packed with hundreds of commercial building operation professionals ready to close Microsoft Teams for 3 full days and, instead, open their ears and eyes to conversations with real colleagues facing the real challenge of using technology to improve our built environment.
What followed was more than 64 educational presentations, almost all of which given by building owners, on how they are overcoming their day-to-day challenges to increase operational efficiency, save energy, secure systems, and bring us to the modern era of buildings.
NexusCon, for 3 days a year, becomes the world's epicenter of smart building technology learning and knowledge sharing. But it doesn't start when the registration booth opens. It starts today, 8 months earlier, with the request for abstracts.
From today until April 17th, 2026, you have the opportunity to submit your application and lead the conversations that will happen on October 5thā7th in Detroit, Michigan.
We've reviewed everything we did last year, taken feedback, and completed another iteration on NexusCon. Below is everything you need to know about educational sessions at NexusCon 2026 and how to submit an abstract that will get you on stage.
A Note on "Half-Baked" Ideas: Donāt let the fear of a "polished presentation" stop you. If you have a gritty, real-world lesson learned but aren't sure how to frame it yet, submit it anyway. If your insight is right for our community, the Nexus Labs team will roll up our sleeves and work with you to get the content stage-ready. We value raw truth over a perfect slide deck.
Our NexusCon 2026 Session Format: Playbooks & Execution Insights
Each educational session at NexusCon is anchored to a Playbookāa repeatable method for building owners to achieve Connected Building outcomes. Nexus Labs has preselected 33 Connected Buildings Playbooks that will be the focus of 2026. To maximize high-value learning, we are using a specific structure:
- The Context: Nexus Labs and the emcee provide an introduction on the Playbook basics (steps, tech, and metrics).
- The Accelerator: Your role as a presenter is to provide Playbook Accelerators.
Playbook Accelerators are not high-level overviews or victory laps. They are deep dives into the "in-the-weeds" detailsāthe specific places where a process broke down and how you overcame that friction.
This is the biggest change to presentations for NexusCon 2026: We set the context for the Playbook in the introduction, so you don't need to include it in your presentation.
Accelerator Examples:
- Example 1 (The Playbook: Occupancy-Driven Operations): Instead of explaining how someone can use occupancy sensors, a speaker shares the specific data-tagging schema used to converge access control and occupancy sensor data at a hospital. They demonstrate how this unified view enabled them to reallocate 20% of their FM staff from low-traffic zones to critical care areas in real time.
- Example 2 (The Playbook: Condition-Based Maintenance): At NexusCon 2025, LinkedIn shared how their FDD rollout stalled because onsite teams viewed proactive alerts as "extra work". To fix this, they pivoted to a "Fee at Risk" contract model, tying vendor profit directly to FDD-generated KPIs like proactive work order completion and comfort scores.
What Weāre Looking For (And How to Get Accepted):
- NO SALES PITCHES: Focus on peer-to-peer education.
- Specific > General: Donāt present the whole Playbook; present a specific lesson learned within it (aka Playbook Execution Insight).
- Actionable & Technical: Include live dashboards, real statistics, and relevant screenshots.
- Progress over Perfection: We prioritize presentations featuring building owners and real building storiesāeven if the story is still "to be continued."
Each abstract application submission is for one presentation related to one Playbook. You may submit as many applications on as many different presentations as you would like.
ā
Sign up for our Newsletter to never miss an update on NexusCon 2026
This is a great piece!
I agree.