Stateside with Stephanie
Celebrating 40 years with the original event tech company
Stephanie Selesnick meets Rich Stone, CEO of EXPOCAD
n 1986, PCs had just been
I introduced by IBM and words such as internet and chat room were used for the first time. Rich Stone was an engineer at a BP Amoco research centre, working with Mike and Paul Ososky. The brothers quit to launch a startup developing engineering software, including two CAD systems. Rich joined them five months later, along with another brother Peter.
Rich says:“ For the first two years there was no salary and we worked a lot of hours. Technology was expensive! PCs cost $ 4,000 a piece. Our first client was BP Amoco.” Subsequently, a good number of Fortune 500 companies became clients.
In fact, every McDonald’ s restaurant is designed with systems the company originally built.
First exposure to expos The decision was made to exhibit in a trade show to find new customers.( Sound familiar?) It was Reed’ s( now RX) 1988 National Design & Engineering Show in Chicago.
“ We had an amazing show, went to the rebook meeting which was conducted in an office with a paper floor plan affixed to the wall, with lots of dots indicating sold booths. The dots kept falling off!
“ Our company had done facilities management, including office layouts with Motorola, and couldn’ t help but notice the similarities with floor plans.” A kernel of an idea was born.
The birth of digital floor plans A few months later, they exhibited in A / E / C Systems Show and the Freeman’ s Chicago Design Department stopped by. Rich recalls:“ They were still designing floor plans on drafting boards( like almost everyone else) and chose us to automate their department.” Thirty eight years later, Freeman is still a client.
Soon after they were introduced to SME’ s George Wooton, the only organiser in the US at the time using a CAD system to design his show’ s floor plan. He gave invaluable
Above: EXPOCAD at Expo, Expo in 2025
Left: EXPOCAD booth 1995 input for our first iteration of EXPOCAD ® in DOS. This was pre- Windows.”( Now they’ re on version 17.)
The launch that changed everything In 1989, NAEM( now IAEE) invited EXPOCAD ® to present a session on electronic floor plans. Rich left with a stack of business cards from organisers. The same year, the first live on-site space selection system was used at a show.“ No markers, no white out, no dots – it blew everyone away.”
In 2000, Rich and the brothers, seeing the huge potential of the exhibition market, gave away their core Auto-CAD reselling business and spun off EXPOCAD ®. The company never looked back.
The birth of AI Mike Ososky simultaneously taught Futurism at the Illinois Math & Science Academy and was excited about AI. Rich recalls:“ On 30 November, 2022, ChatGPT was released. By the second week, we had incorporated AI into our software.”
Paul Ososky passed away 10 years ago, Mike retired, and Peter continues be a senior programmer with EXPOCAD ®. They support over 8,000 exhibitions a year in 24 countries, and seven languages. Clients include contractors, venues( Orlando and Las Vegas Convention Centers, and Amsterdam RAI among them), organisers, and competitors( as all general contractors use EXPOCAD ®).
One cool thing I’ ve seen is the CES live, on-site rebook taking place in two locations simultaneously.( CES is the largest show in the US, and EXPOCAD ® has managed their rebook for the last 27 years.)
Now, using AI, EXPOCAD ® can track buyer intent based on the journey visitors go through on floor plan listings.
Rich and his EXPOCAD ® team have the longest running event tech in our business. Congrats! EW www. exhibitionworld. co. uk Issue 4 2026 15