100 presentations in five days – METAV exhibitors also impressive in Web format

The launch of the METAV Web Ses­sions has been an all-round suc­cess. There was plen­ty of inter­est­ing con­tent on a wide range of pro­duc­tion-relat­ed top­ics and trends accord­ing to the mot­to “Let’s talk about inno­va­tion”. The first major vir­tu­al met­al­work­ing event of its kind was also a tech­ni­cal suc­cess, with few if any major hitches.

Last week, over 80 METAV 2020 reloaded exhibitors gave 30-minute pre­sen­ta­tions, some in Eng­lish, to their cus­tomers. The pre­sen­ta­tions at the Web Ses­sions cov­ered all the major prod­uct top­ics from machine hard­ware and soft­ware through to com­po­nents and services.

At the end of the week it became clear that this was well received. Each of the almost 1,600 vis­i­tors from over 60 coun­tries attend­ed an aver­age of just over three ses­sions. A total of around 5,000 ses­sions were booked. “The feed­back from all those who took part was over­whelm­ing­ly pos­i­tive. It shows that our exhibitors are more than capa­ble of putting on an impres­sive show for their cus­tomers – even on the Web,” reports an enthu­si­as­tic Stephanie Simon, Trade Fairs Project Man­ag­er at the VDW and organ­is­er of the METAV Web Ses­sions.

Alma Zich­n­er, who is respon­si­ble for mar­ket­ing at the soft­ware devel­op­er PSI in Berlin, Ger­many, points out: “The METAV Web Ses­sions were planned and run in a rel­a­tive­ly short space of time. They rep­re­sent­ed a great oppor­tu­ni­ty for us to get in touch with our cus­tomers. Our pre­sen­ters were giv­en incred­i­ble sup­port in prepar­ing for this dig­i­tal form of pre­sen­ta­tion. The length of the pre­sen­ta­tions keeps the whole thing excit­ing and compact.”

And Philipp Dahlhaus, Head of Prod­uct Man­age­ment at Paul Horn GmbH in Tübin­gen, Ger­many, adds: “In these extra­or­di­nary times, the METAV Webs Ses­sion are a great way to raise the aware­ness of our cus­tomers and oth­er inter­est­ed par­ties in the lat­est devel­op­ments. We were also impressed by how smooth­ly every­thing ran.”

The Ses­sions were pre­ced­ed by an inten­sive PR cam­paign to pro­mote the event world­wide. Online chan­nels were main­ly used for this due to the short prepa­ra­tion time. The par­tic­i­pat­ing com­pa­nies also pro­vid­ed strong sup­port by active­ly inform­ing their cus­tomers about the event and invit­ing them to attend. “The whole thing was very worth­while,” says Stephanie Simon, sum­ming up. Cus­tomers from coun­tries near and far reg­is­tered to attend. After Ger­many, the front-run­ners were vis­i­tor groups from India, Switzer­land, Aus­tria, Spain and the Nether­lands. Some com­pa­nies “sent” along class-size groups. Rep­re­sen­ta­tives of big-name com­pa­nies such as ABB, BFW (India), BMW, Daim­ler, Fes­to, HP, Kami (South Korea), Lieb­herr and Linde World­wide were also present.

The for­mat of the METAV Web Ses­sions offered an excit­ing­ly struc­tured plat­form to a large num­ber of providers simul­ta­ne­ous­ly, just like the actu­al METAV. There are plans for fur­ther such events in the run-up to METAV 2020 reloaded next March. “Despite the cri­sis, the Web Ses­sions have enabled us to address not only our own cus­tomers but also a wider audi­ence, too. The METAV Web Ses­sions pro­vide a joint forum for var­i­ous exhibitors, but they also bun­dle a range of dig­i­tal devel­op­ments under a sin­gle brand,” agrees Char­lotte Bre­itwieser, Mar­ket­ing Man­ag­er at Datron AG in Darm­stadt, Ger­many.  Chris­t­ian Weil­er, Head of Devel­op­ment, Indus­trie-Part­ner GmbH Rade­beul-Coswig, Ger­many, con­cludes: “The dig­i­tal for­mat takes a bit of get­ting used to at first, but we’re so grate­ful for this oppor­tu­ni­ty and are inter­est­ed in par­tic­i­pat­ing again.”

Fur­ther Web Ses­sions planned

The wait will not be too long. “The VDW will be explor­ing top­i­cal METAV devel­op­ments in one-day ses­sions at reg­u­lar inter­vals until METAV 2020 reloaded,” announces VDW Exec­u­tive Direc­tor Dr Wil­fried Schäfer.  The pro­gramme will be pub­lished and the invi­ta­tions sent out soon.

Fur­ther infor­ma­tion: Stephanie Simon, VDW Trade Fairs Project Manager,

Tel. +49 69 756081–53, s.simon@vdw.de.