Year after year, HANNOVER MESSE is the showcase for industry - with future topics such as AI, sustainable production or 5G. As a purely digital event, this year's show became a double showcase, not only showcasing the future of industry but also providing a glimpse of the breadth in which trade fairs will be staged in the future.

"The digital edition of HANNOVER MESSE has impressively mapped the innovative power of companies from the mechanical engineering, electrical engineering and IT sectors. At the same time, it has shown that the trade fair of the future is hybrid," says Dr. Jochen Köckler, CEO of Deutsche Messe AG. "Together with our exhibitors and partners, we have once again succeeded in strengthening the brand essence of the world's most important industrial fair: Innovation, inspiration and networking in the age of industrial transformation - that's what HANNOVER MESSE stands for."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel opened the world's leading industrial fair on the Monday of the fair together with Joko Widodo, President of the Republic of Indonesia. 90,000 registered participants gathered information about the 10,500 products and innovations from the 1,800 exhibitors. In the conference programme, 1 500 experts discussed topics such as Industry 4.0, digitalisation of industrial processes, supply chain management, lightweight construction or hydrogen and electromobility.

Köckler: "The popularity of the digital HANNOVER MESSE exceeded our expectations. Nevertheless, it has been shown that a digital trade fair cannot replace the magic of a physical event." Köckler pointed to face-to-face technical discussions, concrete leads at the trade fair stand, the haptic experience directly at the product or chance encounters that can lead to new business partnerships. "The core of the interpersonal is simply missing," says Köckler.

"We therefore see ourselves confirmed on our path to bring together the best of the digital and physical worlds in future, based on the experience of the digital HANNOVER MESSE, in order to create a holistic hybrid trade fair experience for our customers," Köckler continued.

During the five live trade fair days, the 90,000 participants generated more than 3.5 million page views and 700,000 searches in the exhibitor and product search. In addition, the new conference and exhibitor streams were viewed around 140,000 times. Köckler: "The Digital Edition was a successful test and use case for us in every respect. We wanted to find out what concrete benefits digital formats bring to exhibitors and visitors at HANNOVER MESSE."

Köckler's assessment is positive: "Among other things, we now know that we also reach completely new exhibitors and visitors via digital formats. If we transfer these findings to our physical events, we maximise the reach of our trade fairs many times over. In doing so, we are raising the relevance and appeal of the HANNOVER MESSE brand to an unprecedented level."

From next Monday, all contributions will be available on demand. The exhibitor and product search will also remain online. This means that participants can continue to register and take advantage of the services on offer beyond the live trade fair week, as well as contact exhibitors and speakers by e-mail.

The leading German industry associations share the assessment of Deutsche Messe AG:

Prof. Dr. Siegfried Russwurm, President of the Federation of German Industries (BDI): "I pay my utmost respect to the organisers of HANNOVER MESSE Digital Edition for this successful event in times of pandemic. The trade fair management has succeeded in putting together an innovative format that demonstrates the capabilities of our industry despite Corona. The meeting of politicians and suppliers as well as users from industry is an important signal to focus on innovative strength, especially in these times. More than ever, it must be about growing out of the Corona crisis with new solutions and business models."

Dr. Gunther Kegel, President of the German Electrical and Electronic Manufacturers' Association: "This year's HANNOVER MESSE has shown that the brand also has great appeal as a Digital Edition and continues to bring exhibitors and customers together. The electrical industry was once again able to come up with numerous product innovations and show that it is a key player in the global Industry 4.0 movement, which began at HANNOVER MESSE ten years ago. Today, the "Industry 4.0" brand enjoys worldwide recognition and, together with AI and 5G, strengthens Germany's position as a production location in international competition. Our industry needs a strong local trade fair location, which in future will be a mixture of a presence trade fair and attractive digital offerings."

Thilo Brodtmann, Chief Executive of the German Engineering Federation: "HANNOVER MESSE is and will remain the international showcase for industry, even in the age of Corona. This year's Digital Edition of the show has brought together companies, politicians, media and many viewers from all over the world online to present important topics and fascinating technologies. Mechanical and plant engineering has a key role to play here as an enabler for industrial transformation. This applies to climate-neutral production, the mobility of tomorrow, as well as smart production and logistics technologies."

The next hybrid HANNOVER MESSE will be held from 25 to 29 April 2022. The partner country is Portugal.
www.hannovermesse.de

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