Surface Technology Germany 2022: Successful new edition

Visitors to Surface Technology Germany experienced a successful new edition of the trade show in June 2022 after the postponement in 2020 due to pandemonium. Both organizers and exhibitors were satisfied with the course of the trade show.

Around 3000 trade visitors were able to experience current trends as well as solutions, products and services at the Surface Technology Germany industry get-together at the Stuttgart exhibition center from June 21 - 23. Around 220 exhibitors, almost one in three of them from abroad, showed their latest developments and their range of products and services.

According to Deutsche Messe as organizer, after Germany the most visitors came from Italy, Switzerland, Turkey, Austria, India, the Netherlands, France and Slovenia. For the first time, the event recorded a 100 percent share of trade visitors. One in three came from top management, one in four from department head level. Of these, almost one in three came to SurfaceTechnology Germany with very specific investment intentions. Most of them cited the search for new products, an overview of the market and the search for suppliers and new business contacts as the objective of their visit to the trade fair. Further training and knowledge enhancement were also frequently mentioned goals. A third of visitors were also looking for specific solutions for their own companies.

According to the survey, most of the visitors came from the metalworking and processing industry, closely followed by the automotive, mechanical and plant engineering, electronics and plastics industries. Users from the aerospace, medical technology, semiconductor and precision engineering industries also used the trade show to find out about solutions, products and services from the surface treatment industry.

After the long pandamia-related break, the need for personal encounters at a presence trade show was high, which was also noticeable in most conversations. The high quality of the discussions and contacts was also praised, which contributed to the satisfaction of exhibitors and trade visitors. Hendrik Engelking, Global Director Surface Technology at Deutsche Messe AG, summed it up as follows: "This was a successful re-start. Exhibitors and visitors were very satisfied with the course of the event. We are very satisfied with the number of visitors under the given conditions, especially since the quality was extremely high."

Traditionally, the joint stand of the German Surface Technology Association (ZVO) with its approximately 60 companies makes an important contribution to Surface Technology Germany. Christoph Matheis, ZVO Managing Director, stated: "Business contacts, whether existing or new, are based on trust, the basic prerequisite for which is personal contact. After a four-year break due to the pandemic, this was finally possible again here in Stuttgart. The broad spectrum of visitors at SurfaceTechnology Germany enables exhibitors to make countless contacts and hold discussions for which they would need several weeks in conventional sales. So it was a pleasure to see how seamlessly SurfaceTechnology Germany followed on from the last event in 2018, and how visitors embraced the new start amid disrupted supply chains, skyrocketing energy prices, inflation and climate change." Matheis is optimistic about the future, saying, "Our co-exhibitors are consistently positive in their initial conclusions and, as four years ago, are very pleased with the quality of visitors and discussions, even though the number of visitors felt lower than in 2018. The ZVO is optimistic that SurfaceTechnology Germany 2024 will again match exhibitor and visitor numbers from the pre-Corona era."

Dr. Martin Riester, General Air Treatment/Surface Technology Officer at the VDMA, was also satisfied: "After a break in 2020 due to Corona, SurfaceTechnology Germany got off to a successful start again. Despite difficult economic conditions, Deutsche Messe AG has staged an attractive event with an international character. Exhibitors and trade visitors to the show benefited from the wide range of surface technology offerings. On this basis, we are very positive about the future development of the event and look forward to SurfaceTechnology Germany 2024."

The exhibitors at the joint booth "Process Chain Surface Technology" were also successful. The focus here was on the presentation of various surface properties and coatings, which demonstrate the advantages in a wide variety of applications. A second focus this year was the topic of digitalization in the sense of Industry 4.0 in electroplating with its positive results for saving energy and resources and maintaining a safe working environment for employees.

Accordingly, Herbert Käszmann, organizer of the WOTech joint stand, also drew a positive conclusion: "The quality of the discussions is described by the co-exhibitors as consistently positive. On the one hand, the combination of a presentation at the forum and stand space at the joint stand led to numerous, very promising contacts. It was also striking that the contacts for the new technologies in the environment of Industrie 4.0 were almost predominantly made by international visitors to the trade fair."

As a central contact point for knowledge transfer and exchange of experience, the SurfaceTechnology Germany specialist forum was consistently well attended on all three days. With an extensive program of a total of 48 presentations, the forum offered an insight into the current world of surface technology. There was a great deal of interest in the use of laser technology, as well as in the possibilities for creating functional surfaces using PVD processes and the large field of technologies known as alternative coating processes. Above all, however, it became apparent that coating companies are currently working on increasingly using the possibilities of data processing, which are on everyone's lips under the abbreviations AR, VR or AI, in daily practice and thus making their processes more efficient. Likewise, the change in the automotive industry towards e-mobility plays an important role for a large part of the coating companies.

The highlights of the forum also included the presentation of the Stuttgart Innovation Award "The Surface" by the Fraunhofer IPA (see also our detailed report on this). The 2022 award winner was Dürr Systems AG with the topic "Overspray-free paint application with EcoPaintJet Pro". "With great staying power and together with partners from the paint and automotive industries, the company has brought the idea of completely overspray-free wet painting to fruition, potentially creating a disruptive innovation," praised juror Michael Hilt, managing director of the Forschungsgesellschaft für Pigmente und Lacke e.V. . The Speakers Corner as a meeting place for speakers and listeners also proved its worth and was actively used. For the first time, the technical forum was also streamed live on the event website. (OM-06/22)