The Hameln-based company put its digital innovation lab into operation on the premises of the Lenze subsidiary Encoway at the beginning of May. The facility is intended to help the Lenze Group with its internal development work, and projects are planned jointly with customers, partners and research establishments here: the ideas factory is intended to develop Industry 4.0 projects and digital business models and products. The Lenze Group currently employs over 200 staff at its Bremen site and a further 40 are to be added in the course of next year.

In recent years, several innovation centers have been created that specialize in the development of digital solutions for Industry 4.0. As recently as the end of 2017 the region of Lower Saxony launched a Center for Additive Production in Hanover , at about the same time as Telekom, in cooperation with Fraunhofer IML in Dortmund, opened Telekom Open IoT Labs , where experts of both companies are developing Internet of Things solutions for the production industry, logistics and aerospace.