- Industry 4.0 Forum 2020 – call for papers now open

Hannover. Every seat was quickly taken – with standing room only – but that didn’t keep more and more people from following the discourse from the aisles. Whenever AI is the topic, the Industry 4.0 Forum draws in the crowds, and next year will surely be no exception. "At HANNOVER MESSE, Industry 4.0 is stepping up and taking its rightful place on center stage," commented Arno Reich, the Senior Vice President at Deutsche Messe in charge of the forum. "Once a sideline topic, digital transformation has quickly risen to become a megatrend, and the Industry 4.0 Forum has been instrumental in the process. The global industrial sector turns to HANNOVER MESSE and its supporting forums and conferences as a prime source of orientation and inspiration in times of technological transformation. The lead theme chosen for HANNOVER MESSE 2020 – ‘Industrial Transformation’ – is therefore the perfect choice."

The call for papers for the next edition of the Industry 4.0 Forum is now open, and industrial experts and R&D specialists are welcome to submit their proposals. The 2019 edition attracted more than 7,500 attendees, well up on the already well-attended 2018 forum. The hot topics in 2019 were artificial intelligence and machine learning. Dr. Martin Ruskowski, head of the Innovative Factory Systems research unit at the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI), drew the largest audience at the forum with his paper entitled "From Industry 4.0 to Artificial Intelligence in Manufacturing".

The post-show analysis also points to keen interest in specific, implementation-ready solutions among HANNOVER MESSE visitors, with applied examples of the RAMI 4.0 Reference Architecture Model and Industry 4.0 components coming a strong second in the visitor popularity rankings. Other hot topics in the Industry 4.0 arena include the Industrial Internet of things and the question of how businesses, particularly small and medium businesses, can leverage Industry 4.0. The big societal questions, such the place of people and work in the Industry 4.0 landscape, also tend to attract a great deal of interest, as do displays and discussions relating to predictive maintenance and predictive analysis and, in the B2B space, platform business models.

HANNOVER MESSE 2020 will build on these key topics and the interest they have garnered. At the Industry 4.0 Forum, international experts will again be using use cases, test beds and technologies to highlight the exciting opportunities made possible by the digitalization of production chains and products. The forum will also feature daily panel discussions, where attendees can dialogue with stakeholders in the fields of business, R&D, politics and the public sector. Other core program points include interoperability, safety, security and standards. The Industry 4.0 Forum is an integral part of the Automation, Motion & Drives display at HANNOVER MESSE.

Here you'll find details on the Industry 4.0 Forum and how to submit a proposal.