Grinding technology manufacturers showing strong commitment to Stuttgart as new hub for sector — UGOs causing a stir among visitors

Grind­ingHub, the new trade show for grind­ing tech­nol­o­gy, is set to pre­miere from 17 to 22 May in Stuttgart.

About 340 well-known exhibitors from more than 20 coun­tries have already signed up for the first event. This will under­pin GrindingHub’s declared inten­tion to become a major inter­na­tion­al hub for the sec­tor. “There is a great sense of antic­i­pa­tion,” says Dr. Wil­fried Schäfer, Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of the Grind­ingHub orga­niz­er VDW (Ger­man Machine Tool Builders’ Asso­ci­a­tion), Frank­furt am Main. “Most trade shows have been forced to take a break over the last two years, and all par­tic­i­pants can­not wait now to meet every­one again in per­son,” Schäfer con­tin­ues. “Dig­i­tal events sim­ply don’t have the same qual­i­ty and reach as their face-to-face counterparts.”

Exhibitors show­cas­ing world pre­mieres at the GrindingHub

For their part, exhibitors are strong­ly com­mit­ted to the Grind­ingHub. “It feels like the Grind­ingHub has already start­ed: our team, our cus­tomers and part­ners sense that this new lead­ing tradeshow will be a dri­ver for our entire indus­try. Con­se­quent­ly, we are prepar­ing the most com­pre­hen­sive, inno­v­a­tive, and excit­ing dis­play in the his­to­ry of ANCA, includ­ing world pre­mieres, six machines and automa­tion high­lights. Get a glimpse at the web ses­sions and press pre­view,” says Edmund Boland, Gen­er­al Man­ag­er of Anca Europe GmbH, Weinheim.

Oskar Olai, CEO of 3nine, Hochheim, is full of antic­i­pa­tion: “We’re very much look­ing for­ward to meet­ing with our part­ners, dis­trib­u­tors, cus­tomers and poten­tial cus­tomers again after the long and iso­lat­ed time dur­ing the pan­dem­ic. Grind­ingHub is our first trade show in Ger­many since 2019 and I know that all my col­leagues at 3nine are super excited.”

Jür­gen Hauger, Man­ag­ing Direc­tor of the Bib­er­ach-based Vollmer Group, also believes the new trade show for grind­ing tech­nol­o­gy has a bright future. “The orga­niz­ers have suc­ceed­ed in putting togeth­er an attrac­tive trade show in an ide­al loca­tion that is geared to the needs of our glob­al cus­tomers. We are con­vinced that Grind­ingHub will become the new lead­ing trade show for grind­ing tech­nol­o­gy. Vollmer will be unveil­ing no less than five world firsts at the first Grind­ingHub in May 2022.”

UGO* – a vis­i­tor pro­mo­tion cam­paign designed to cause a stir

This week also sees the launch of the vis­i­tor pro­mo­tion cam­paign for Grind­ingHub. “UGOs – Unknown Grind­ing Objects – are uniden­ti­fied fly­ing objects that will be land­ing in Stuttgart in the future,” says VDW Exec­u­tive Direc­tor Schäfer. They are designed to arouse curios­i­ty, just as UFOs did in the past. Head­lines such as “UGO* bring­ing exper­tise to Stuttgart.” or “UGO* mak­ing dig­i­tal impact” are being used as teasers. “Any­one wish­ing to find out more must come along to Stuttgart in May,” says Schäfer, address­ing the inter­na­tion­al grind­ing community.

Exhibitors and vis­i­tors can take part in the #ShowYou­rU­GO chal­lenge and show­case their UGOs. “The best UGOs can then be viewed at first hand in Stuttgart in May,” Schäfer concludes.

Author: Tobias Beck­mann, VDW Press and Pub­lic Relations

Back­ground Grind­ingHub 2022 in Stuttgart

The first ever Grind­ingHub will be held in Stuttgart from 17 to 20 May 2022. It is the new trade fair and the new cen­ter for grind­ing tech­nol­o­gy. It is sched­uled to be run every two years by the VDW (Ger­man Machine Tool Builders’ Asso­ci­a­tion), Frank­furt am Main, in coop­er­a­tion with Messe Stuttgart and the “Machine Tools” indus­try sec­tor of Swiss­mem (Asso­ci­a­tion of the Swiss Mechan­i­cal, Elec­tri­cal and Met­al Indus­tries) as insti­tu­tion­al patron. Grind­ing is one of the top 4 man­u­fac­tur­ing process­es with­in the machine tool indus­try in Ger­many. In 2021, the sec­tor pro­duced machines to the val­ue of 805 mil­lion euros, accord­ing to VDW esti­mates. Just over 80 per cent were export­ed, with about half going to Europe. The largest sales mar­kets are Chi­na, the USA and Italy. The VDW has world mar­ket data up to and includ­ing 2020. Chi­na, Ger­many and Switzer­land head the list of top glob­al pro­duc­ers. The grind­ing tech­nol­o­gy sec­tor pro­duced 4.3 bil­lion euros worth of machines in 2020.