June 2025

Agenda

DAY 1

08:00 - 08:50

REGISTRATION

08:55 – 09:00

CHAIRPERSON’S OPENING REMARKS

09:00 - 09:30

Challenges and opportunities for data and AI in high-speed mass production

  • It all begins and ends with Data Engineering; the unsung hero of the AI revolution
  • Empowering the experts with data and AI tools
  • Buy vs. make vs. build: how to be agile, but cost-efficient in a VUCA environment
  • Small successes along the way: selected use cases in manufacturing

Enno De Lange, Director, Digital Transformation, Johnson Electric International

09:30 - 10:00

Driving maximum productivity through plant performance optimization

Holistic continuous improvement framework covering 3 key dimensions is needed to get maximum productivity in manufacturing set-up:

  • Performance: Value creation in the form of performance improvement is always leading – It will demand a set of structured practices/methodologies to create max visibility on improvement potential (value)
  • Practice: Fit for purpose tools & best practices to solve the problems & to improve the performance. Fit for purpose is key word here. Digitalization including data analytics also fits in here
  • People: Mindset & behavior aspect, leadership elements, people development, communication & change management, recognition etc.

When these 3 dimensions together bring the maximum productivity. I have implemented this framework twice & got great results. It also helps to create self propelling productivity culture which can make my job redundant over time. This is also a proof of pudding, isn’t it.

Sachin Sankpal, Head of Group Excellence & Digitalization, Vynova Group

10:00 - 10:30

Balancing craftmanship and automation for higher output

  • Context of the workshop starting situation
  • Lean study
  • Lay out and process flow improvement: one piece flow
  • Bringing output to higher level with robotics
  • Final results

Frank Timmermans, Head of OT & OpEx, Tessenderlo Group

10:35 - 11:25

COFFEE BREAK

11:30 - 12:00

INNOVATING FOR THE REAL WORLD – REMOTE VISUAL ASSISTANCE FOR ANYONE, IN ANY LOCATION, AT ANY TIME

  • Remote visual assistance tools (a.k.a. remote expert guidance tools) are used by all kinds of people, in all kinds of places and environments across the globe. From the tech savvy office worker in a highly connected city center, to the production worker at a rural industrial site.
  • Building innovative tools that don’t just work in the city office, but also in the rural industrial location, comes with challenges.
    – What are the challenges of building real-time remote collaboration tools in the real world?
    – What are the risks if you deploy a solution that does not take these challenges into account?
    – What are some innovations to address these real world challenges?
  • Bottom line: Learn how to deploy real-time collaboration tools, such as remote visual assistance, for large scale use in the real world. By anyone. Anywhere.

Taskin Kilincat, Senior Sales Manager – Digital Sales Direct, GE Vernova

12:00 - 12:30

The journey to the data-driven manufacturing

  • Why we should pursue a data-driven approach
  • The shop floor: first fix the basics
  • Collect and correlate all the data you need: unified name space
  • Use cases

Pier Giuseppe Dal Farra, Smart Industries Business Expert, Orange Business

12:30 - 13:00

Global production footprint: The key for the factory of future

  • Production footprint at a turning point?
  • What are current challenges of production companies?
  • What are strategic guidelines to find the right footprint?
  • How does a Factory of the future look like?

Carsten Freiherr von Hadeln, Principal, ConMoto Strategie und Realisierung GmbH

13:05 - 13:55

LUNCH

14:00 - 14:30

SmIoT X OpenSource: Empower and digitize the industry with open-source data driven intelligence

  • Concept of “reality to virtual” and “virtual to reality”: Integrating digital twin and IoT into your manufacturing process
  • The role of Open-Source Drives Innovation and Collaboration
  • Increase Flexibility and Scalability of SMIoT systems and adapt to changing market demands and technological advancements more quickly and effectively
  • Enhanced Data Utilization and Analytics with Open-Source
  • Future of Manufacturing is Open and Connected

Arqum Ahmad, Digital Factory CTIO, Leonardo

14:30 – 15:00

Digital manufacturing Transformation in Danone: People, Value & Tech

  • Digital Manufacturing Acceleration in a nutshell, unique approach to deliver holistic result
  • Recipe of successful program: Mixture of right ingredients
  • Value Stream
  • Tech Stream
  • People Stream
  • Success factors of the program

Manuel Aguado Puertas, Global Digital Manufacturing Manager, Danone

15:00 – 15:30

Procedural Knowledge Governance in Manufacturing: PERKS project experience

The PERKS project experience: how creating, maintaining and using procedural knowledge in manufacturing

  • Procedures and people competences in the shop floor: challenges
  • PERKS Project Experience: What is a procedure? Holistic governance of procedural knowledge
  • An application in manufacturing: LOTO (LogOut Tag-Out) safety procedure management in maintenance operations

Enrica Bosani, Manufacturing Innovation Project Manager, BEKO Europe

15:35 - 16:25

COFFEE BREAK

16:30 - 17:00

Disrupting the status quo in global industry

  • A systemic problem in global industry is having a hugely negative effect on business performance
  • Most manufacturers and ecosystem suppliers are not aware of the issue
  • A paradigm shift is required to deal with the global challenges we face
  • This session will highlight the problem, propose solutions and present case studies

John Robinson, Managing Director, Kearney

17:00 - 17:30

Collective intelligence to facilitate productivity and innovation

  • Use AI to facilitate collective intelligence and Boost productivity
  • Facilitate Systematic innovation (incremental or disruptive) with guaranteed results 2 to 8 weeks
  • Smart Open Innovation

Constant Ondo, CEO, PICC SOLUTION

17:30 - 18:00

AR/VR on the Pharmaceutical shopfloor

  • Technology overview
  • Technology history within JnJ
  • Use cases at manufacturing site Leiden
  • Use cases at manufacturing site Beerse

Alexander Vayzer, IT Lead Small Molecule Manufacturing Site, Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine
Tunde Akande, IT Lead Large Molecule Manufacturing Site, Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine
Roeland Bollen, IT Support Project Manager Engineering & Facility Services, Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine

18:00 - 19:00

DRINKS RECEPTION

DAY 2

08:55 – 09:00

CHAIRPERSON’S OPENING REMARKS

09:00 – 09:30

Connected Leadership, Employee Engagement and the role of Connected Workers on the Shopfloor

  • Developing a vision for change and clearly articulating the benefits for your business and workforce
  • How to develop a multi-site deployment strategy with scalable growth in mind from the start
  • Harnessing big data and advanced analytics to drive informed decisions on the frontline
  • Achieve improvements in efficiency, cost savings and customer satisfaction with predictive maintenance solutions

Hugo David Herrmann, Smart Factory and Operational Excellence – Europe & Asia, IAC Group GmbH

09:30 – 10:00

Opportunities of IoT for Smart Manufacturing

  • Many companies want to start with a first IoT prototype implementation for smart manufacturing, but are not sure how this can be done in a cost and time efficient manner
  • There are so many buzzword out there in the IoT domain, that it is really cumbersome to find out what technology is relevant for a prototype
  • It will be also explained what e.g. Edge Computing, Streaming Ingest, Data Enrichment, Immutable Data Store means and how it can be used
  • Finally it will be shown how a first IoT prototype can be built from scratch, following the principle “Start small, succeed fast, extend step-by-step”

Stefan Schleyer, Domain Principal Architect – Technology Development, SKF GmbH

10:00 - 10:30

How AI can bridge a global skills crisis

  • In an age of automation and skills shortages how will the role of industrial workers change?
  • Richard will share a vision of how AI and automation is augmenting the role of industrial workers and what changes organisations need to make to adapt

Richard Milnes, CEO & Co-Founder, Zaptic

10:35 - 11:25

COFFEE BREAK

11:30 – 12:00

Unlocking Success: Harnessing Simulation Across the Lifecycle of a Production System

  • How to utilize simulation along the lifecycle of a production linen
  • Benefits of simulationn
  • From idea to Digital Twin

Samuli Ahonen, Head of Simulation Experts, Visual Components
Liisa-Brett Sonnenberg, Sales Manager, Visual Components

12:00 – 12:30

Automated Image analysis for manufacturing control

  • Why automate image analysis
  • How to automate image analysis with one system only
  • How to apply AI based image analysis in manufacturing
  • How to enhance manufacturing control with those results
  • How to combine image classification with other data

Michael Meinel, CTO, Convanit
Ines Thurner, CEO, Convanit

12:30 – 13:00

Accelerate business value creation through data

  • Artificial Intelligence is opening new possibilities on top of existing data & analytics.
  • Plenty of potential business use cases: predictive maintenance, dynamic production quality control, supply chain optimisation, anomaly detection
  • The problem remains the same: no data, no data projects.
  • Focus on what you want to achieve business-wise and get the data to flow to your projects with low-code governed stream integration.

Marc Delbaere, CEO, Digazu

13:05 - 13:55

LUNCH

14:00 - 14:30

Data Science @Eneco

  • How to make successful data products
  • What are the most common challenges?
  • What works in practise?
  • How to we validate our Models?

Kaustav Basu, Squad Lead Data Science, Eneco

14:30 - 15:00

Upskilling needs for future workforce

Key success factors for successful digital transformation : People, People & People

  • How do you envisage future operator, engineer, management in manufacturing (from skills/competence point of view)
  • In future, eco-system approach would be more visible where entire value chain would be connected & working together but are we ready for that from competence stand point ?
  • Are we confident that we will get digital savvy talents across value chain to make it a success or find win-win ? Organizations are focusing a lot on digitalization without giving enough attention to human aspect.
  • Are we optimizing our organization models/design accordingly ? Some of the macro factors – trend that we see in future generations, people want to work less due to work-life balance, many customers do not want to see suppliers F2F after Covid as hybrid mode works.
  • How do we see our workforce should evolve, are the right talent strategies are in place to be ready for future digital era ?

Sachin Sankpal, Head of Group Excellence & Digitalization, Vynova Group

15:05 - 15:10

CHAIRPERSON’S CLOSE

Heike Roeder

  • Heike Roeder in her position as Lead Digital Transformation Quality Management System is responsible for transformation of documentation-based quality management towards data-driven digital solution. This transformation comprises the quality standards as classically defined in SOPs and respective quality knowledge.
  • Since many years she is industry influencer for digitalization and holistic transformation: “From document to data”. She is member of the board of directors of the Pharma 4.0 ISPE.
  • Heike brings in a wealth experience from 20 years in the Pharma Industry, in senior positions in various business areas, such as commercial production, supply chain, clinical trial supply, learning and process management, and quality management.
  • She graduated from the University of Düsseldorf (Germany) with a degree in Pharmacy and is certified as Lean Sigma Green Belt and as Change Coach for systemic changes.

Josef Kriegmair

Josef Kriegmair works as Representative Production Turbine Blade / Structure Castings at MTU Aero Engines AG Center Production. His main task has been the development and implementation of digital process chains and manufacturing intelligence systems for turbine blades and structure castings since 2010. Prior to that, he was in production engineering with a focus on technology development for production and for maintenance, repair and overhaul. He hold roles in logistics and plant maintenance at MTU Aero Engines from 1997 to 2001. Josef started in technical procurement at MTU. He holds a degree in Mechanical Engineering focus Production Technology and a degree in Industrial Engineering focus Project Management and Technology Management.

Josef Kriegmair

Reinhard is a partner at PwC with 25+ years of industry and consulting experience. He leads PwC’s Industry 4.0 globally. Reinhard specializes in horizontal and vertical integration of the value chain (Industry 4.0), optimizing end-to-end supply chain. He has vast experience in developing digitization strategies and is a thought leader in supply chain, manufacturing and service innovation. Exemplary projects:

• Digitalization strategy and execution

• Digitalization and supply chain optimization

• Smart factory transformation

Reinhard holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) with a focus on international Finance and Operations, from the University of Kentucky and a Ph.D. in International Business Administration University of Regensburg.

Sarah Bodo

Experienced Digital Specialist with a demonstrated history of working in the chemicals industry. Passionate about technology and solving problems. People benefit from a lot of inspirations, creativity, support and willingness to fight for a better world. Strong operations professional graduated from HAW Hamburg.

Doug McKnight

Doug McKnight is leading Dow efforts to derive value in safety and productivity across Dow’s Operations in EMEAI through the adaptation of Industry 4.0 solutions. He partners with Dow’s businesses and technical functions and coordinates across all of the varied sites for the company in the region. He is located in Wiesbaden, Germany – at the seat of the Digital Operations Centre for EMEAI. He is part of Dow’s newly established “Operations IT/OT” function for the company – signaling the intent within Dow to drive digitalization. Before taking this current challenge in the Industry 4.0 world, his experience is in industrial operations leadership including environment, health and safety, production and site leadership, external manufacturing management, supply chain, continuous improvement techniques and advanced process control and systems dynamics modelling. Across his career in ICI and Dow, Doug has lived in many European countries including the Netherlands, Switzerland, France and now Germany where he lives with his family.

Curtis Carson

Since graduating from Ryerson University, Curtis’ journey has taken him to Italy, USA (2 times), Germany and finally France. His experience has included working on the development of the Boeing 787, Airbus A380, and Airbus A350 and realizing a childhood dream working with the Ferrari Formula 1 race team during ’99 and ’00 season. Since setting roots in France in 2006 and joining Airbus in 2011, Curtis has been active with the launch of a variety of the companies forward thinking digital transformation projects, covering topics such as Factory of the Future, AR-augmented reality, 3D printing, IIoT, model based systems engineering methods, advanced robotics & automation to name a few. Curtis’ current role since July 2017 covers transforming and integrating engineering processes across the diverse and rich engineering landscape of Airbus Defense and Space.

Lucretia Loescher

Lucretia Loescher leads the industrial solution business in Europe for Siemens Energy. She has experience in various industries and functions. Her career started in 2004 with sales and marketing for the automotive industry. To broaden her experience, she moved into consulting with main emphasis on innovative technologies, process industries and the energy sector. Subsequently she became Director of Sales Operations for OSRAM Lighting Solutions, followed by an assignment as Vice President Strategy, HSE and Business Improvement for Siemens Energy. She is an ambitious mountaineer, runner and diver. On Arctic expeditions, she gets to know the earth in its extreme. She is the deputy chairwoman for the Bavarian Red Cross in Munich.

Andrea Moroni Stampa

Andrea Moroni Stampa has studied electronic engineering at the ETH Zurich. After some international experiences as a development engineer, he created the R&D department inside Hemargroup, an electronic assembly and production company. Today he is leading a team of 10+ development engineers and is a proud startupper and innovator.

Dr. Michael Thierschmann

Operational Excellence expert based on professional career experience in Research & Development, global technology Marketing & Sales, strategy & process consulting as well as line responsibility in global industrial corporations

Harald Kirsch

Dynamic, entrepreneurial business strategist with over 30 years of professional experience in organizational and business development in the segments of Digital Transformation, IIoT, Artificial Intelligence, Cyber Security, automation of enterprise processes, sales of innovative SW solutions and services, portfolio management, consulting, system integration services, outsourcing as well as business transformation, change management, product management and product development.

My current area of responsibility includes in particular:

- Management of the Automation and Industrial IT division

- Continuous further development of the company's digital strategy

- Structuring and advancing the Industrie 4.0/ IIoT platform strategy

- Optimization, digitalization and further development of manufacturing and production processes

Juha Pankakoski

Juha Pankakoski is a member of the Konecranes’ group executive board, responsible for the development of group core technologies, digitalization, IT, and central procurement. He’s held number of functional and P&L executive positions during the years. Prior to joining Konecranes, Juha worked in IT and Telecomms sectors. He and his wife live in the Finnish archipelago with two Nova Scotian retrievers.

Klaus Schmücker

Klaus Schmücker heads the digital strategy of the BSH Home Appliances Group, to transform the group from a hardware manufacturer to a provider of connected products, digital services and ecosystem offerings. From positions in consulting and at E.ON and Thüga, he has extensive experience developing and executing digital strategies and successfully transforming companies of different industries into digital business models. Klaus hosts a CDO & Digital Strategists network in Munich and is a member of the Digitalization Committee of the Munich Chamber of Industry and Commerce.

Jonas Szalanczi

As the CEO and Co-Founder Jonas Szalanczi leads NeuroForge with a clear vision for industrial AI, BigData and Innovation. With his technical background and project experience, he monitors and controls the operational and strategic business process. With his innovation-driven attitude, he positions NeuroForge as the German partner for the use of state-of-the-art AI-technologies at the spearhead of the digitization of the industry. In exemplary projects, he demonstrates NeuroForge's speed, quality and digital competence:

- AI with every kind of Data

- Solving the questions everyone has on AI

- Establishing trust in ai-projects with NeuroForge’s AI development process

Stephan Gerling

Stephan Gerling is a German security researcher working in Kaspersky Lab’s Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team (ICS CERT) where he is responsible for conducting vulnerability research, giving lecture and talks at conferences, conducting incidence response and delivering live and online ICS cybersecurity training programs.

Today Stephan is particularly interested in security for Maritime systems (navigation and control systems) and “smart motor homes”. He enjoys conduction penetration testing of ‘Internet of Things’ devices ranging from electronic door locks to industrial control systems. He has previous experience as a security evangelist in Oil and Gas Industries, Helicopter Navigation System Specialist and 34 Years volunteer firefighter as Platoon leader.

Stephan is certified as CISSP, GCFA, MCSE + security and several other certificates.

Dr. Alexander Below

Alexander brings modern digitization to very traditional industries. After getting his Ph.D. in large mathematical optimization problems he applied these methods to scheduling of locomotive drivers and conductor at Deutsche Bahn’s long-haul traffic – the first of a longer string of process optimization projects. For the last years he has headed the Digital Transformation at DB Cargo, Europe’s leading rail-freight operator. During his tenure, he put in new digital customer interface as well as new service design systems, capacity booking systems, several mobile applications for rail-freight operating staff, production steering systems – to name a few –, and transferred all of DB Cargo’s IT landscape to “the cloud.” He shaped the way digitization is done at DB Cargo, and he is a strong believer in “Business IT Fusion.” In 2021, he formulated the bold new Digital Strategy of DB Cargo, unifying digitization initiatives, modernization of the IT landscape, and the physical automation initiatives needed to ensure the economic and ecological goals of DB Cargo.

Mathias Sundbäck

I am positive and curious, and I like to work together with people toward set targets. I enjoy working within improvement and strategic areas. I fill my free time with family, friends and training. Depending on the season and weather, I have a lot of different activities that I do regularly such as barefoot running, hiking and skiing.

Prof. Franz Dietrich

• Current position: Full Professor at TU Berlin, heading the Chair of Handling and Assembly Technology Research
• Previous Positions at TU Braunschweig, Institute for Machine Tools and Production Technology
• Member of the German Academic Society for Handling, Assembly and Industrial Robotics (MHI e.V.)
• Member of KliB Competence Network Lithium Ion Batteries e.V.
Production technologies for a more liveable and sustainable world. I do this as a senior researcher, a patent-awarded inventor, an experienced consultant, a successful leader, a noteable speaker, a teacher, and as a career coach.
10+ years of leadership, research and consultancy with dedication to industrial automation, advanced robotics, smart factory and sustainable automation.

Kaustav Basu

Experienced in academia and industry, he is working as a lead data scientist at Eneco, Netherlands. He holds a Phd in Electrical and Computer Science from Grenoble Alps University, France. Other Than creating exciting live products/services used by over 500K utility customers he has authored multiple patents and publications.

Alon Arnon

Alon joined ASOCS in 2021 to head the German Market and global strategic accounts. Bringing with him extensive knowledge in digital and technology transformation programs, across the globe, in telecommunication and Industry 4.0 markets. Forming and executing innovative strategies to bridge technologies benefits with Industries 4.0 goals, he brings to the table E2E knowledge built over 20 years of hands-on experience in international sales, business development and engagement practice. Alon started his way in Amdocs to grow BSS/OSS practice, spent 7 years in Ericsson to bring 5G to consumers and Industries and now marking the path for ASOCS 5G software solution to generate Next generation insights using 5G software and Ecosystem partners to German and Global Enterprises on their digital journey.
Alon holds various awards in Telecommunication and holds an M.B.A. in Computer Science (Open University in Israel).

SACHIN MATHUR

Sachin Mathur is a DIRECTOR SOFTWARE & CONTROL EMEA at Rockwell Automation.
He is specialized in navigating organizational transformational programs, identifying, and enabling end-customer business outcomes via new technologies and partner ecosystems. Sachin is a true believer in pushing “out of the box” execution strategies and driving digital transformation by joining hands with domain experts in a partner ecosystem.

Lydia Kaiser

Lydia Kaiser is heading the Chair of Digital Engineering 4.0 at the Technische Universität Berlin and the Einstein Center Digital Future. She is member of the digital council of the federal ministry of defense. The Digital Council advises the Federal Minister of Defense on digitalization issues.
Lydia Kaiser studied Physics at the Paderborn University and received her Ph.D. 2013 in the field of Model-Based Systems Engineering under the supervision of Prof. Jürgen Gausemeier. Lydia Kaiser was research associate for three years at the chair Product Engineering at the Heinz Nixdorf Institute of the Paderborn University. In 2012, she changed to Fraunhofer Institute for Mechatronic Systems Design in Paderborn. In the research department of Prof. Roman Dumitrescu she was group leader and head of the devision Systems Engineering.

Tilmann Kloppe

Tilmann Kloppe is currently part of the Business Excellence and Quality Management Function at the Rolling Stock (Rail) Business Unit of Siemens. Driving Digital Transformation with focus on process improvement is a major part of his role. Before he joined the Railway Industry he held several management positions in the Air- and Space Industry and Power Generation Industry. He accumulated knowledge and leadership experience in different areas such as Project Management, Supply Management and Operations. Certainly one career highlight was a green field project he successfully led in Eastern Europe.

Dr. Lydia Nemec

As Head of the ZEISS AI Accelerator, Dr. Lydia Nemec and her team work closely together with all ZEISS businesses to create fully operational machine learning products that drive business success for ZEISS. Coming from academic research in high-performance computing and numeric algorithm development, Lydia started her exciting career path in theoretical and computational physics as a post-doc at Fritz Haber Insitute of the Max Planck Society and TU Munich. Before joining ZEISS, Lydia worked as a Senior Data Scientist on Machine Learning development and cloud-based data products at Knorr-Bremse. As part of the ZEISS Data & Analytics unit, Lydia leads the ZEISS Data Science team and is at the forefront of ZEISS´ next generation of AI-infused product and service innovations.