Nuremberg Digital Festival: Schaeffler brings digitalization to life
From ChatGPT to digital workplaces and virtual factory tours – at the Nuremberg Digital Festival, Schaeffler presented various facets of digital transformation and showcased its broad expertise in digitalization.
What is a digital workplace? What will the production of the future look like? And how do we master the constant stream of new technologies? Schaeffler provided answers to these and many other questions at this year’s Nuremberg Digital Festival. In its capacity as gold sponsor, Schaeffler was supporting the open interactive format for the second time since 2022.
Four events in Nuremberg and Herzogenaurach
“The Nuremberg Digital Festival connects the region’s digital talents. The best ideas and solutions emerge from the interplay between various perspectives.” Marc Votteler, CIO of the Schaeffler Group
This year Schaeffler offered four events at its sites at the AirCampus in Nuremberg and the Digital Transformation Center in Herzogenaurach. The events were accessible to all interested members of the public and offered informative content on digital technologies and solutions as well as a platform for dialog between digitalization experts, visitors, and partners. Around 330 participants accepted the invitation to take part between July 6 and 11 and were enthusiastic about the great variety of digital technologies and solutions that the experts in IT and digitalization had prepared for the visitors.
The digital world of the future
The opening session was the event “Unlocking the Future”, featuring keynotes and a panel discussion about innovative technology issues with Marc Votteler, CIO of the Schaeffler Group, Dr. Inga von Bibra, Customer Success Lead at Microsoft Germany, and Dr. Florian Harzenetter, Global Advisor Industrials at PTC. To create digital solutions, exchanging different points of view is indispensable, which is why Schaeffler has a robust digital ecosystem with strong partners.
As well as Schaeffler’s two strategic partners Microsoft Germany and PTC, the KI Park and the University of Bayreuth were also involved in the event. As well as interesting insights into the current and future digital working environment, there were interactive market stalls on topics such as generative design, augmented reality, and virtual reality. The event was also live streamed and you can watch it in full.
Digital dexterity
The event “Unlock the potential of digital dexterity!” covered the digital dexterity that is an absolute “must-have” in a complex, interconnected world. Because the development of digital skills can open doors and help people find their way in the constantly changing digital landscape. The interactive sessions therefore focused on work hacks, for example – in other words, useful tips on how to use digital tools. Participants were able to take away their own personal “key learnings” that they had presented to the other visitors during the event.
Experiencing IT workspaces
The journey continued with “Explore the Schaeffler IT Workspaces”, a tour of the Digitalization and IT Campus in Nuremberg, where digital innovations and New Work come together. Schaeffler employees from various areas gave an insight into their work during this tour and showed how Schaeffler is putting modern ways of working into action.
The pathway to the digital factory
The final event was “How Bits and Bytes Save Steel and Energy” in the Digital Transformation Center in Herzogenaurach. This is the birthplace of the new technologies and digital solutions that make the 83 Schaeffler plants even more efficient, flexible, and sustainable every single day. A varied program of digital factory tours, key-user training sessions, virtual reality, digital twins, and low-code applications gave visitors a glimpse into the digital factory of the future.
The future of intelligent manufacturing
Alongside the company’s own events, Schaeffler colleagues took part in an event hosted by Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nuremberg on the topic “The Future of Intelligent Manufacturing”. Prof. Dr.-Ing. Tim Hosenfeldt, Senior Vice President, Corporate Research and Innovation & Central Technology at Schaeffler, held a keynote address, while colleagues from Share at FAU presented solutions relating to artificial intelligence, a topic on which Dr. Maik Horn also gave a talk.
About the Nuremberg Digital Festival
The Nuremberg Digital Festival is committed to showing the many opportunities that digitalization offers. The open interactive format has been running since 2012 and is held in July each year. Now bringing more than 150 organizations from the Nuremberg metropolitan region together every year, Schaeffler has been involved in the Festival since 2019.
August 2023