EMO Hannover repositioning
Focus at the world’s leading trade fair for production technologies on the future of industrial production
“Hello, new EMO Hannover!” is the greeting that was shared at the EMO Hannover Relaunch Conference in the hybrid event hub “H’UP” on the Hannover Messe trade fair grounds. As organizers of EMO Hannover, the German Machine Tool Builders’ Association (VDW) had invited international media representatives and EMO Hannover exhibitors to a digital presentation of the new exhibition concept on September 14 of this year. Fascinating keynotes and stimulating discussions gave an introduction to the concept and the topics. Experts from the worlds of business and politics debated on the future of production technology. “The sector is in a constant process of transformation and is facing huge challenges. As the leading global trade fair, EMO Hannover must reflect these, make them transparent, and propose solutions, if it is to continue to be of relevance for the future,” explains VDW Executive Director Dr. Wilfried Schäfer. And so, the association has been working full-out over the past months, partly in cooperation with international exhibitors, to present this claim with clarity and to lend substance to it.
“Innovate manufacturing” as incentive and claim in one
“Innovate manufacturing” is the new claim of EMO Hannover 2023. “It addresses the challenges that will face the industry in the months and years ahead,” Carl Martin Welcker, General Commissioner of EMO Hannover 2023, explains. It is an invitation to everyone involved in EMO, exhibitors as well as visitors, to be constantly reinventing themselves, improving and expanding their offers, streamlining their processes, and tapping new markets so as to position themselves as best possible amidst international competition. At the same time, the claim describes EMO Hannover as an innovation platform for production technologies that has evolved into an internationally relevant business platform – for more than just the exhibition period. To which Welcker added that the fair demonstrates the full breadth and depth of the technologies for renewing and optimizing industrial production.
“But ‘Innovate manufacturing’ addresses more than just technologies. In fact, EMO Hannover will in future also be taking on board topics that are of relevance for production technology and for its customer industries throughout the world,” said Welcker in his keynote on “Challenges for production 2023”. The future insights of EMO Hannover 2023 – “The future of connectivity”, “The future of sustainability in production”, and “The future of business with focus on Work 4.0” – are already the subject of intensive discussions in the business world and in society at large. Welcker feels strongly: “As we see it, without laying any claim to exhaustiveness, these are the key topics that industry and society as a whole will have to tackle in the years to come in order to make themselves fit for the future and the urgent tasks in hand such as the energy revolution, climate change, sustainability in production, new competitors, the transformation of key customer industries, digitization, changes in the employment world, new data-driven business models, and many more besides.” And none of these is a stand-alone. Far more, they are interlinked, mutually enriching, and they have to be dealt with and solved together in order to be fully effective. Over and above these, of course, the classics – quality, efficiency, flexibility, and reliability – will also be addressed, since they still continue to set the tone for developments in production technology.
“We have initiated a dialog by means of the EMO Hannover Relaunch Conference,” said Welcker. “The diverse challenges will not have been resolved by the time of the next EMO Hannover in 2023, but exhibitors and their customers will have hit the road together on this journey, and in Hannover they will present what they have achieved by then,” the General Commissioner announced.
EMO Hannover as key real and digital meeting point for the industry 365 days a year
“Dialog and encounter are two of the most crucial elements for the new EMO Hannover. Already apparent in the mode of address, this is evident at many points in the new EMO presence, and is also carried forward in a clearly structured communication concept,” said VDW Executive Director Schäfer, picking up the thread once again. The communication concept rests on the four pillars EMO Communication, EMO Connect, EMO Digital and EMO Conference. These include new formats such as “speakers’ corner”, master classes, or EMO Academy, as well as familiar offers such as matchmaking or guided highlight tours – including digitally. The future insights of EMO Hannover are to be found there once more, along with many other topics drawing on exhibitors’ activities as well as on research and development.
Besides that, however, the aspiration of the new EMO Hannover is to become established as the key meeting point for the industry, obviously during the exhibition itself, but also between events, with an accompanying digital program, 365 days a year. “The point is to develop and shape these formats with our partners by the time of the exhibition,” Schäfer announced. There will be a large number of events around the globe in the run-up to EMO Hannover 2023, such as the EMO World Tour in the early months of 2023, picking up the topics mentioned, outlining the particular challenges they present in the respective regions of the world, and presenting the solutions production technology has to offer for them.
Then, in summing up, he added, “Since 1975, EMO has been the world’s leading trade fair for metalworking. It is now more than that. It encompasses the entire value chain, primarily integrating the IT that is so essential for continuing to drive forward intelligent factory networking. These digital twins will always be a feature of EMO Hannover in future. And it is more than a sales platform. We engage in dialog with our customers, exhibitors, and visitor target groups, drawing them together in networks, mediating knowledge, and offering sound information for investors.”
The EMO Hannover Relaunch Conference is now available as a stream on our Youtube channel MetalTradefair.
You will find texts, images, and videos on the EMO Hannover Relaunch Conference online in the Media section of our new website www.emo-hannover.de/en.
Follow EMO Hannover on our social media channels as well with #emo2023
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