This year’s Hannover Fair, held April 8-12, attracted 6,550 exhibitors from 62 nations. As the strongest Hannover Fair in the past 10 years, it fully met the high expectations placed on it by the industry, further consolidating its position as the world’s premium showcase for industrial technology.
Automation World was present at the event, covering press conferences and visiting with the many automation vendors who had booths at the show. The one major theme was "Industry 4.0," an initiative of the German government supported by all of the German automation companies. Executives from Bosch Rexroth, Festo and Siemens took pains to speak to the many ways they support the initiative, which emphasizes information technology and a "virtual" manufacturing represented in digital form.
This year, Russia was featured as the show’s official partner country. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russian President Vladimir Putin opened Hannover Fair 2013 April 7 at a function attended by more than 3,000 invited guests. Russia presented itself as a major economic force and an attractive global trading partner. By means of close dialogue with industrial stakeholders from around the world, Russia used the fair to establish key partnerships for the future.
Putin was a controversial choice as a trade fair partner, with many protestors to his human rights record present at the entrances to the fair grounds. Russian businesses and engineers were visible throughout the fair grounds, though.
With a total of about 225,000 attendees, Hannover Fair 2013 matched its strong performance of 2011. The fair also attracted a high percentage of industry professionals and top buyers and decision-makers. One in every four visitors came from abroad, mainly from the European Union (50 percent) as well as from South, East and Central Asia (20 percent). The largest visitor contingents were from the Netherlands (3,500) and China (3,400), followed by India, Italy, Austria and Denmark.
The next Hannover Fair will be April 7-11, 2014.
