(Frank Dietsche) A full house and good atmosphere among the attendees in Stuttgart at the warm-up for AMB 2026 was a promising start for the most important industry trade fair this year. The team around AMB project manager Romy Arnold has already been actively promoting with the AMB roadshow in recent months and has encouraged information events at various locations, companies, and professionals to visit the fair.
With the AMB Preview 2026, Landesmesse Stuttgart has created a format that offered exhibitors the opportunity to describe their trade fair appearance and highlights in short presentations. For this, the AMB team had planned four exhibitor highlight areas. Representatives of these companies took the opportunity for short presentations:
- Presentations in the field of machine tools
CHIRON Group SE, Citizen Machinery Europe GmbH, DMG Mori, FFG, DN Solutions x Heller, GROB-WERKE GmbH & Co. KG, INDEX-Werke, United Machining Solutions, Yamazaki Mazak Deutschland GmbH
- Presentations in the field of automation, software & digitalization
FANUC, Imnoo AG, Kurt Breuning IRCO Maschinenbau GmbH, OPEN MIND Technologies AG, Siemens AG
- Presentations in the field of precision tools
CERATIZIT, Gühring KG, Haimer GmbH, HAINBUCH GmbH, Paul Horn GmbH
Hoffmann Group, ISCAR Germany GmbH, MAPAL Dr. Kress SE & Co. KG,
ROEMHELD, SCHUNK.
- Presentations in other areas
3N Solutions GmbH, Castrol Germany GmbH
Industry associations also used the event to briefly present the current situation.
Guido Reimann, deputy managing director of VDMA Software and Digitalization, started his presentation with the statement 'we need a strategy in the companies'. Potential for the digitalization of processes or services exists, although many companies are already very advanced.
In an interesting presentation, Markus Heseding, managing director of VDMA Precision Tools, outlined the difficult raw material situation for manufacturers and thus also for users of precision tools.
Dependence on China, the price development of tungsten, cobalt, and also synthetic diamonds creates worries in the industry. On the one hand, a raw material shortage in carbide production and a looming shortage of grinding tools due to a lack of synthetic diamonds clearly describe the dilemma of manufacturers. Availability is thus endangered, and Markus Heseding strongly appeals to all parties involved that carbide scrap must be kept in the German or European recycling cycle.
Heseding expects a balanced budget for the industry by the end of the year.
Guido Reimann, deputy managing director of VDMA Software and Digitalization, started his presentation with the statement 'we need a strategy in the companies'. Potential for the digitalization of processes or services exists, although many companies are already very advanced.
Dr. Markus Heering, managing director of VDW, pointed out that China has now overtaken Germany and Japan as a producer and exporter of machine tools. Interestingly, this statistic also includes machine tools produced in China by German companies. In the most important markets for German machine tools, China and especially the USA are in the leading position. The industry expects a slight decline in 2026 compared to the previous year.
The managing director of Messe Stuttgart, Roland Bleinroth, emphasized that although many companies are struggling due to geopolitical developments, they are represented as exhibitors at AMB. For him, this is a positive sign for AMB 2026 and the future.
The two AMB project managers Romy Arnold and Julian Reime emphasized that the number of German exhibitors is very encouraging, while the share of international exhibitors has also slightly increased. Both are very optimistic and look forward to a forward-looking AMB under the motto 'Where metal comes alive'.
The world has changed, and so have the conditions for companies in the industry. Aerospace, defense, mechanical engineering, and medical technology are gaining more and more importance and partially compensate for the struggling automotive industry. The organizers of AMB have recognized this and have modernized the program around the fair. Both the organizers and the presentations of the exhibitor representatives radiated optimism, motivation, passion, and anticipation for AMB 2026 at the Stuttgart exhibition center.
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