FRI AM News: WisBusiness: the Podcast with Rob Thelen, Rownd; MCW exec touts impact of AI on precision medicine

October 24, 2026

— This week’s episode of “WisBusiness: the Podcast” is with Rob Thelen, CEO and co-founder of Rownd.

The autonomous drone technology company is headquartered in North Carolina and has flight-test operations in Richfield, where it’s opening a new R&D center later this month. Rownd last week announced the launch of its AI drone systems, as well as a $10 million contract it has secured with the U.S. Department of Defense.

“A warfighter might need to understand something that’s downrange, and they can put one of our systems in the air and it will autonomously go find what’s over there and report back without any user inputs,” Thelen said.

Since launching in 2022, Rownd now has active contracts with U.S. Special Forces and the Air Force and is working with the U.S. Navy on a “large exercise” and related opportunities.

Thelen, who grew up in Oconomowoc, discusses his background with IBM and the military, as well as the company’s roots in the West Coast startup accelerator Y Combinator. After starting with authentication services to healthcare organizations and government entities, the company pivoted toward “edge AI” applications and set its sights on drone applications.

Rownd’s smallest “quadcopter” drone with four motors can fit inside of a backpack, while its larger fixed-wing machines are seven feet across.

“The drones themselves are being built right here in Wisconsin,” Thelen said.

He explains the company’s approach to drone innovation, noting its machines differ from those that need to be manually controlled at all times.

“You may have seen people with the cool goggles on them, or they might be looking down at a screen with joysticks, kind of playing a video game. We’ve gotten rid of all of that,” Thelen said. “We don’t believe that the future of warfare is people playing video games.”

Instead, the operator communicates to the machines what to do and “the drones themselves have the intelligence onboard to go run that mission,” Thelen said.

The conversation also explores ethical considerations for autonomous weapon systems, as well as how AI has transformed the modern battlefield by enabling cheaper autonomous drone fleets and faster combat evolution.

“It is both terrifying in the sense that AI is making it so any organization on the planet … can create killer drones, but it’s also exciting because with the right purposes, we can really protect American soldiers and get them off the battlefield altogether in the future, which is my goal overall,” Thelen said.

Listen to the podcast here and see the full list of WisBusiness podcasts.

— An executive with the Medical College of Wisconsin says the healthcare field is poised to deliver on the true promise of precision medicine thanks to AI.

David Hotchkiss, vice president and chief information and security officer for MCW, yesterday addressed attendees of BioForward Wisconsin’s Biohealth Summit in Milwaukee.

“Precision medicine … that’s long been the desire in healthcare, but it’s been a tagline because we’ve never achieved it,” Hotchkiss said. “And I think now we’re on the cusp of doing it, because … the only thing that holds us back is the compute available to the problem we’re chasing.”

He highlighted the technology’s potential to assess the wide array of data within a given patient’s electronic health record and point to the most likely diagnosis, as well as other potential causes that may be playing a role.

Still, he and other panelists yesterday stressed the importance of building trust in these systems, as well as proper data governance and regulation to ensure the results of AI decisions can be trusted.

Peter Szotkowski, global head of portfolio for computational sciences for Roche subsidiary Genentech, said AI is helping the biotech firm optimize molecules for drug development. He said the technology can “expand the possibilities” for what’s typically a linear process.

“The trustworthiness comes in when you put that human in the loop, or you keep the human embedded in the loop as you expand the opportunities for what they can interrogate,” he said yesterday.

That view was echoed by Phil Nwafor, director of healthcare and life sciences strategic industries for Google Cloud, who also stressed the importance of external regulation in this space. While he emphasized the company’s internal guardrails, aimed at preventing bias or weaponization for a given AI application, he also said “we’ve been very vocal” about the need for regulation.

“Regulation, for us, we believe is the way,” he said. “Yes, it might cause a slowdown but the cost is heavy if we don’t do things the right way.”

At the same time, members of the medical community are clamoring for AI tools in a way they haven’t previously for other technologies, according to Hotchkiss.

“This is the first time in my career that clinicians have asked for this tech, that those that are providing care want technology,” he said. “Everything else we have dictated to them … it’s all been billing, it’s all been regulatory, it’s all been something that’s been mandated to them.”

Panelists yesterday also discussed the role of AI in advancing pilot projects, with Szotkowski noting the technology is “introducing a new paradigm” for impactful pilot efforts.

“When we apply some of the AI solutions, the barrier of entry to use that … is so much lower than it was before,” he said, adding “we get a lot of value out of utilization of AI even at the pilot stage in a lot of use cases.”

Still, panelists cautioned against the tendency of “chasing shiny objects” in the world of AI deployment, pointing to the importance of proper foundational readiness, seamlessly integrating it into operations and appropriate data “ownership” within the organization.

Nwafor called for ensuring “the data is not just accurate, it’s traceable, explainable, it’s secure” and verifiable within the AI system.

“Being able to take care of that house and then eventually building AI competency on it, it usually leads to that scale of success,” he said.

— During the only debate of the governor’s race, GOP candidate Tom Tiffany said he wouldn’t sign legislation as governor that would ban abortions after six weeks, even though he introduced such a bill while in Congress with no exceptions for rape or incest.

Tiffany on Wednesday night said he supported the state’s ban on abortion after 20 weeks, which he voted for while in the Legislature.

Dem David Crowley declined to say where he would draw the line on when abortions should no longer be performed during a pregnancy, saying those are “decisions that need to be made between a patient and their healthcare provider.”

Crowley knocked Tiffany for celebrating a 2022 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that ended the national right to an abortion, saying, “Women are holding their breath every four years just to make sure that they can get access to the care to protect themselves, and we need to make sure we’re doing exactly that.”

Tiffany later said, “All you women out there, you will not have to hold your breath when I’m governor.”

Meanwhile, Tiffany also said he supports recreational marijuana, and said “we’ll take a step-by-step” approach.

Crowley affirmed his support for full legalization so long as there are guardrails to protect children and products are clearly labeled so consumers know the contents of what they’re taking.

This week’s debate was organized by WISN-TV and produced in partnership with WisPolitics. The two candidates also sparred over data centers, taxes and other topics seen as top issues going into the November election.

See more debate coverage.

For more of the most relevant health care news, reports on groundbreaking research in Wisconsin, links to top stories and more, sign up today for the free daily Health Care Report from WisPolitics and WisBusiness.com.

Sign up here.

— Dairyland Power Cooperative has announced plans to explore the use of small modular reactor nuclear technology at the site of a decommissioned nuclear plant in southwestern Wisconsin.

The La Crosse-based co-op yesterday announced it had signed a letter of intent with Applied Atomics, Inc. to “evaluate the potential deployment” of the nuclear tech firm’s SMR technology at Dairyland’s Genoa site. This could include one or more of these installations, which are much smaller than traditional nuclear power plants.

Along with assessing the potential for deploying the technology, the co-op says it will explore purchasing the energy it would produce through a power purchase agreement with the nuclear developer.

The site previously was home to a 50-megawatt nuclear power plant, along with a 345-MW coal plant that was retired in 2021. It also retains a spent fuel storage installation licensed by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the announcement notes.

“The site’s power generating history, existing transmission infrastructure and Dairyland’s growing energy needs combine to make this one of the top opportunities to deploy clean, affordable nuclear power by the early 2030s,” Applied Atomics CEO Ben Kellie said in a statement.

Meanwhile, the regional energy grid operator yesterday also announced Dairyland Power Cooperative is one of three organizations chosen to develop and operate a $1.23 billion transmission project in Iowa. Others include Ameren Transmission Company of Illinois and GridLiance Heartland LLC, a subsidiary of NextEra Energy Transmission.

Dairyland will own a 15% stake in the project, according to yesterday’s release on the Midcontinent Independent System Operator’s decision.

— The Universities of Wisconsin’s next president will again come from outside the system with three newly announced finalists currently working at institutions in Alabama, Mississippi and Tennessee.

All three, though, have an academic background, unlike former President Jay Rothman, who was fired by the Board of Regents in April. He had been chairman and CEO of the Foley & Lardner law firm in Milwaukee for more than a decade before he was hired in 2022.

The UW yesterday announced a search committee has identified finalists:

Steven Gareth Holley, executive vice chancellor and chief operating officer, University of Mississippi
Tonjanita L. Johnson, senior vice chancellor for academic and student affairs, University of Alabama System
Bernard J. Savarese, vice president for academic affairs, research, and student success, University of Tennessee System

They will next appear at a public forum Monday at UW-Parkside and Tuesday at the Madison campus. Following the forums and additional rounds of interviews, the search committee will forward a recommendation to the full Board of Regents, which will make the hire.

The next hire will be UW’s 10th president since the system was created in 1971.

Since former President Ray Cross retired in 2020, Jim Johnsen, then president of the University of Alaska, withdrew from consideration amid concerns about his record and backlash over the selection process. Former Gov. Tommy Thompson then stepped in as interim president before Rothman was hired.

These are the 3 finalists to lead Wisconsin’s 13 state universities

ATC projects 6.2% rate decrease with proposed data center charges

TOPICS

AGRIBUSINESS

– Soil health advocate Jim Luedtke receives IMPACT Award

CONSTRUCTION

– Privately funded initiative aims to simplify backyard home construction in Milwaukee

ENVIRONMENT

– 9,000 muskies stocked in Wisconsin waters after tribal, club, state collab

FOOD & BEVERAGE

– Ahead of closure, Delta Beer Lab owner reflects on 8 years of beer

HEALTH CARE