Due to the corona pandemic, the organizer of SPS, Mesago Messe Frankfurt, was forced to cancel SPS as a physical event. As an alternative, the virtual SPS Connect will now take place at the same time. The match-making event will be accompanied by a supporting program. The preliminary program has now been published. In addition to presentations on smart and digital automation, there will be two different key topics on the agenda each day, which will be explored in more detail in keynotes, specialist presentations, panel discussions and exhibitor contributions.

The topics include cyber security and IT in manufacturing, robotics/functional safety/motion/DC infrastructure and artificial intelligence as well as intelligent operating concepts, sensor technology, Industry 4.0, digital twins and industrial communication. The range is rounded off by current topics such as the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the industry, for example in a presentation by Dr Gunther Kegel, ZVEI President, entitled "Coronavirus - catalyst for digitalization?".

The lecture program

Mesago welcomes experts from the industry and the world of associations for the specialist presentations. These include:

• Gerd Hoppe from Beckhoff Automation. He will be talking about the cloud and Gaia-X.
• Dr. Marco Link, Managing Director of Adamos, will talk about creating value from machine data.
• Frank Hakemeyer (Phoenix Contact) and Dr. Andreas Müller (5G-ACIA) will talk about the relevance of 5G.

Other speakers will be talking about TSN and OPC UA as well as Single Pair Ethernet.

Partnership with Siemens

Mesago Messe Frankfurt is also presenting Siemens as an official partner of this year's SPS Connect. Marcus Bliesze, Head of Marketing Factory Automation at Siemens Digital Industries, explains the partnership as follows: "As a platform for intensive technical discussions and exchanges with customers and partners, SPS plays a central role for Siemens. This has enabled us to establish long-standing customer relationships and deepen partnerships. We support SPS Connect as a virtual event and look forward to continuing our dialog with our customers through our participation in order to jointly drive forward the digital transformation of the industry. Our goal is to bring more intelligence into product design and production by combining automation and digitalization solutions with future technologies such as artificial intelligence, edge and cloud computing or additive manufacturing. At our virtual event 'Digital Enterprise SPS Dialog' on November 26, 2020, we will be discussing these topics in more detail in face-to-face talks and showcasing further highlights in a virtual 3D showroom."

As part of the 'Digital Enterprise SPS Dialog', Siemens would like to offer participants an insight into the latest technologies such as AI, 5G, 3D printing as well as edge and cloud computing in panel discussions and specialist presentations.

Sylke Schulz-Metzner, Vice President for SPS, on the partnership: "We are proud to have a strong partner like Siemens at our side. The company is a mainstay of SPS and we are looking forward to further intensifying our good cooperation at the virtual event."