LIGNA: Preview | 29
Above left: The world’s timber press descended on Hannover for the Ligna Preview Above right: Dr Jochen Köckler explains Ligna 2023 features
“Two years ago it was not really clear that trade shows were able to survive,” said Dr Jochen Köckler, CEO of Deutsche Messe. “But we realised that the feeling of trade
shows with physical people cannot be replaced with Zoom meetings. Get out of your home office, Zoom meeting and come to Ligna!” he implored. “We are positive to do these trade shows again. All the markets leaders are here with us and they trust in Ligna. The global woodworking community is coming back together.” He revealed that exhibitor numbers were currently (in February) at the level of pre-pandemic shows, with 1,118 exhibitors, some 745 of which were from outside Germany.
That equates to an exhibition space of 107,233m2
. The high proportion of international
visitors, Dr Köckler added, set Ligna apart in exhibition terms. If you haven’t been to the biennial Ligna, it
is like a sprawling metropolis, encompassing some 10 halls at the Hannover Messe, as well as large outside spaces for timber handling vehicles and forestry equipment. Hall 26 is the centre for wood-based panels production. Exhibitors will show how far the
networking of machines, tools, components and materials has already gone and will present innovations in the fields of robotics, automation and software. The buzzwords Smart or Connected
Factory, Industry 4.0 or Internet of Things and IoT platforms will continue to become tangible at Ligna with concrete examples. “Digitalisation is not a negative challenge, it’s a tremendous opportunity,” said Dr Köckler.
As well as technology exhibitors, Ligna has a number of focus points, including the Ligna Stage in Hall 12, which will see key presentations and discussions, including themes of prefabricated building processes, woodworking transformation and green material processing. The Ligna FutureSquare will include a section called Future Business World, allowing business start-ups to present themselves onsite, aimed at exhibitors and visitors of Ligna alike.
The Ligna Campus will focus on research and development, training and education, featuring technical colleges and universities presenting their programmes here. For instance, The Rottenburg University of Applied Sciences will examine how hardwood can be used in an innovative way, showing examples of wood modification use and development of hardwood based cross-laminated timber, substitution of wood preservatives for exterior use and replacing of tropical hardwoods by using domestic hardwoods such as beech, birch or maple wood in musical instrument making. Digital elements of Ligna 2023 will include an app, business ‘dating’, digital contacts and guided tours.
“There is no reason why Ligna will not be fantastic this year, we have the exhibitors and the visitors,” concluded Dr Köchler.
WOODWORKING MACHINERY BUSINESS RESILIENT Markus Hüllmann, VDMA Woodworking Machinery chairman, provided some interesting statistics on Germany’s woodworking technology industry. He said the sector had record demand until Q2, 2022 but it was then impacted by shortages in the supply chain amid
geopolitical disruptions, creating uncertainty. These difficulties persisted today, extending lead times for machinery deliveries, raising prices and making scheduling projects challenging. “However, the market has still been strong and we have managed these shortages very well,” he said.
Incredibly, sales of German woodworking machinery reached their highest-ever level in 2022 with a value of €3.5bn, up €100m on 2021. This year it is expected to slip back again slightly but machinery makers surveyed by VDMA in December 2022 are still generally “cautiously optimistic”. The top three export markets for German machinery in 2022 were the US, China and France. Italy and the UK both registered a high increase in their woodworking machinery imports from Germany. Mr Hüllmann quoted the managing
director of the IMF in his presentation: “It is less bad than we felt a couple of months ago. But less bad does not quite yet mean good.”
Another VDMA member survey revealed that digitalisation and automation were two of the biggest opportunities for woodworking machinery. “The opportunities outweigh the risks,” he said.
TIMBER CONSTRUCTION Another key note speaker at the preview was Professor Achim Menges of the University of Stuttgart who shared the work of a cluster of excellence looking into timber in construction.
This area is being billed by Ligna organisers
as a key theme for the industry. Using AI, the research teams developed models of long span high performance timber structures.
www.wbpionline.com | April/May 2023 | WBPI
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