Statements from the community

"Digitization offers the process industry enormous opportunities to further optimize production processes. To be able to use this potential, however, a close exchange between industrial companies and providers of digital solutions is essential. The digital hub offers the perfect framework for this and can make an important contribution to putting digital innovations into practice faster."

Dr. Klaus Schäfer, Chief Technology Officer

"The global process industry faces a time of drastic change – the impact of global warming increasingly influences what is done whereas digitalization changes the way how things are done in R&D, business and operations. It is obvious that only the fastest and most adaptive players will win.
We therefore welcome the decision of the world’s largest trade fair for the process industry to establish a Digital Hub to open a unique opportunity to gain essential knowledge and network."

Dr. Wolfram Stichert, Chief Executive Officer

"We are very much looking forward to the first Digital Hub at Achema 2021, as one of the most important exhibitions for process industry. Seeing the dynamic of this market, the changing ecosystem, customer needs and the tremendous opportunities of digitization, the Digital Hub will be a great place for dialogue and exchange.
We are excited to discuss the trends, demands and how technologies like cloud computing, AI, IoT, mixed reality and digital twins can help to unlock new efficiencies and business opportunities. Taking the chance of transition means enabling new business models and fundamentally rethinking the entire manufacturing value chain. We as Microsoft, together with our partners, strive to enable every manufacturer, employee and customer of the process industry on that journey around the world to achieve more."

Melanie Weber, Industry Executive

"ACHEMA is a driving force for the process industry on its way to digitization. The establishment of a 'Digital Hub' comes at the right time to address the digital challenges thematically, while providing the opportunity for us all to deepen and expand existing networks. In addition to the discussion of general strategic issues, we will present our IIoT and Augmented Reality technologies, which enable innovative digitization concepts to be implemented quickly and easily in the process industry. The importance PTC attaches to this market will be further demonstrated by the numerous use cases and scenarios that some of our customers will present."

Reda Mostafa, Business Development Director

"Digitalization is great! But what if the necessary data is hidden in silos, inaccessible to those who need it most? The Corona Pandemic makes these everyday hurdles even more acute. Not least to present solutions for these and many other challenges - across manufacturers and systems - we shall meet at the Digital Hub Achema 2021."

Helmut Schuller, Chief Executive Officer and Founder

"The ACHEMA Digital Hub is a great opportunity for everyone in the process manufacturing industry to learn about the digital transformation, latest advancements in technology and how to let people interact securely with things, data and processes.

The digital transformation in the process manufacturing industry is rapidly accelerating on the back of the 5G developments. At MYNXG, we believe that digital security and integration between operational and information technology should be major focus areas in such transformations.

Security is the most important aspect of digital transformations which typically is not understood. Working digital is about combining loads of business data with millions of distributed devices and letting many people interact with it. This creates inherent cyber security risks. Only integrated digital platforms, with hardware based, end-to-end encryption and secure blockchain transactions, can effectively address these risks.

The major benefits of digital transformations in the process manufacturing industry are achieved when operational environments are connected to business systems. This allows companies to take every step of their supply chain digital and drive automation without compromises. It saves time, money, reduces risks in processes and helps companies to discover the true potential of products and assets that they deployed. In addition, it allows them to create amazing, real-time user expierences for any of their customers.

The ACHEMA Digital Hub creates a new place where people and technoloygy meet. This hotspot brings leaders, experts, enthusiasts, talents and digital solution providers together. Digital technologies are often recognized as complex and difficult to understand and the Digital Hub addresses this challenge by allowing experts in process manufacturing and experts in operational and information technology to collaborate.

At MYNXG we are experts in secure industrial IOT and believe that our unique smart, realtime and secure industrial IOT platform and integrated architecture can add significant benefits to the process manufacturing industry and sets a standard for security in this space.

We are looking forward to the first ACHEMA Digital Hub in 2021 and meet other experts within the process manufacturing industry to drive the digital transformation together, securely."

Bernd Möller, Chief Executive Officer and Founder

"NAMUR is driving digitalization in the process industries. We are looking forward to ACHEMA 2021 casting a spot light on “Industrie 4.0” in the process industry. This will be a success, if we can bridge the gap between IT visions and real production requirements. That’s what a fair like ACHEMA is ideally suited for: IT meets process industry, but please: hands-on and with proven feasibility in our brownfield plants. As NAMUR, we are committed to contributing to the Digital Hub’s success!"

Dr. Felix Hanisch, Chairman of the Board

"Digitalization is and will remain one of the central drivers of the chemical industry - today and in the future. Business is changing, the boundaries between industries are becoming blurred, Industry 4.0 is entering a new phase of high connectivity and high data availability. The merging of Operation Technology and Information Technology is thus becoming all the more important and remains a challenge. It is therefore a good thing that the digital hub at ACHEMA 2021 is using new approaches and concepts to promote intensive exchange between IT and cloud providers and the process industry."

Dr. Henrik Hahn, Chairman of the Digitalization Working Group of VCI and Chief Digital Officer, Evonik Industries AG

"With their innovative products and digital solutions, our manufacturers of measurement technology and process automation ensure that process equipment and plants can produce quickly, flexibly and efficiently. A good example of this is ZVEI's MTP technology (Module Type Package), as part of the Modular Automation initiative. Our 5 G-ACIA ensures the optimal communication infrastructure. The Digital Hub at ACHEMA 2021 is an excellent opportunity to present these future-oriented technologies to the world of process industries."

Nikolaus Krüger, Chairman of the Section Measurement Technology and Process Automation and Chief Sales Officer and Board Member, Endress+Hauser Group

"The Digital Hub at ACHEMA 2021 becomes the voice for Industry 4.0 standardization. The German mechanical and plant engineering industry plays a key role as a supplier and user of Industry 4.0 technologies. It collects data, interprets it, innovates with it and develops new business models. Industry 4.0 must be economically viable and implementable, especially for small and medium-sized companies.

One challenge here is the manufacturer-independent exchange of data by defining uniform interfaces in production. They define the communication in the industrial environment. In mechanical and plant engineering, the interface standard "Open Platform Communications Unified Architecture" (OPC UA) has established itself. This is an open interface standard that enables mechanical and plant engineering to digitally network production. Standardized interfaces also simplify the exchange and use of data and form the basis for Industry 4.0 use cases such as Condition Monitoring or Plug&Work.

The Digital Hub at ACHEMA offers exhibitors and visitors an excellent information platform for the topic of Industry 4.0 standardization."

Andreas Faath, M.Sc., VDMA - Forum Industrie 4.0