Innovative international impetus: most visited automatica ever

automatica, the leading exhibition held from June 24 to 27, 2025, was an impressive demonstration of approaches to solving future challenges using smart automation and robotics. Around 47,500 visitors from more than 90 nations, along with approx. 800 exhibitors from 40 countries, and an extensive supporting program underlined automatica’s domain leadership.

The four-day trade fair had a strong focus on AI-powered robotics, SME automation, health tech solutions, mobile robotics, and networked production. A successful range of topics according to Dr. Reinhard Pfeiffer, Co-CEO of Messe München. “automatica once again inspired the entire industry. The trade fair has seen significant growth in terms of both visitors and exhibitor participation, despite adverse economic conditions. That underlines its status as a must-attend in the industry.” Hubert Aiwanger, Bavaria’s Minister for Economic Affairs, stressed the significance of these future technologies during his tour of automatica and its co-located trade fairs Laser World of Photonics and World of Quantum. “Robotics and automation are going to revolutionize our production processes. The integration of Artificial Intelligence in particular will unlock a range of new possibilities.”

Exhibition Director Anja Schneider is delighted as well: “800 exhibitors and a whopping 1,120 robots made automatica an incredibly impressive crowd-puller covering the entire value chain. And I am particularly pleased with its pronounced employment fair character.”

Patrick Schwarzkopf, Managing Director of VDMA Robotics + Automation, also feels the trade fair was a great success. “automatica 2025 has shown that robotics and automation are the key to strong competitive positioning. It has provided an impressive confirmation of its claim to global leadership through real-world AI solutions, automation for SMEs, and networked production: It is the place where worldwide novelties and the future of automation is presented first.”

Exhibitors pleased with extensive inspiration

Exhibitors from all areas have come to a positive conclusion on automatica 2025. “automatica is one of the most important events not only for FANUC but also for the entire European robotics industry.” said Takayuki Ito, President of the International Federation of Robotics (IFR) and former Vice President at Fanuc. “It brings together global technology leaders and users to exchange ideas, explore innovations, and drive the future of automation. I greatly appreciate this platform for international dialog in my capacity as President of the IFR.”

Reinhold Groß, CEO of the robotics segment at KUKA, also came to a positive conclusion. “This year, we have seen remarkable interest from customers who have not automated yet. Thus, automatica 2025 was the perfect stage for us to demonstrate that ‘making automation easier’ goes well beyond providing easy and intuitive access to robotics.” Martin Bender of Bender + Wirth confirms from a user perspective that this is one of the major reasons for an increasing number of SMEs to turn towards automation. “I represent an SME and really appreciate the technical discussions with the exhibitors. The whole experience makes me feel that I made the right choice by joining automatica,” says Martin Bender. “The trade fair spreads inspiration and motivates me to try new things as we move forward on our automation journey.”

Record visitor survey results

94 percent of exhibitors gave the trade fair an excellent to good rating in a survey conducted by the Gelszus market research institute. They particularly appreciated the visitor quality (88 percent) and the increase in new customer acquisitions (87 percent). Correspondingly, Frank Konrad, Chairman of the Board and CEO at HAHN Automation, is quite satisfied with the four trade fair days: “automatica 2025 was yet another indicator of just how crucial smart automation and robotics are for the industry’s future. Agility, an open mind with regard to new technology, and constructive regional economic policy are pivotal factors in securing Europe’s role as an automation powerhouse. We experienced great inspiration in Munich and have a clear take-away from the week we spent here: The future is automated—and we are prepared to shape it together with our customers.”

Successful trade fair participation

Neura Robotics introduced their new humanoid generation at automatica 2025. “The trade fair has given us the opportunity to present our vision and products to tens of thousands of people,” said David Reger, Founder & CEO of NEURA Robotics. “We are honored by the incredibly overwhelmingly positive response and great interest in more than 60 NEURA robots.”

MVTec Software is another exhibitor looking back on successful trade fair days. “We once again had plenty of great discussions this year—with both potential new customers and long-time partners. It was the unabated continuation of a trend that makes automatica ever more important for us and the machine vision industry at large as it evolves into an indispensable platform for exchange,” said Managing Director Dr. Olaf Munkelt.

Almost 35 percent of international visitors

The great exhibitor ratings are also reflected in the visitor statistics. The top ten visitor countries after Germany were Austria, Italy, Switzerland, South Korea, China, Poland, the UK, Czech Republic, the USA, and France. The share of international visitors was almost 35 percent. 99 percent of exhibitors gave the trade fair an ‘excellent’ to ‘good’ rating. Furthermore, 95 percent of visitors praised the presence of market leaders, and the same share of respondents confirmed the leading role of automatica as they gave the overall atmosphere at automatica good to very good ratings.

Top-notch supporting program

“My first time at automatica was a fantastic experience,” said industry advocate Jake Hall (The Manufacturing Millenial). “I got a deep dive into product innovations while seeing new technologies, start-ups, and education shaping the future of the industry.” Like many other visitors, he was an active participant in the extensive supporting program. 14 showcases and stages, more than 270 keynotes, ten guided tours, and three workshops facilitated top-level exchange and knowledge transfer. There was a special focus on health tech with numerous exhibits from across the industry and the two-day MedtecSUMMIT.

Further, the munich_i Hightech Summit was all about the megatrends in robotics and AI. This event was once again curated by the Munich Institute of Robotics and Machine Intelligence (MIRMI) at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and featured top-level speakers from companies such as Google DeepMind, Microsoft, and Nvidia. Prof. Lorenzo Masia, Executive Director of MIRMI, sums it up. “automatica is the perfect place to showcase the institute’s capacity of aligning to the different challenges in robotics and AI that are calling right now. And of course to network with the industry players we would like to interact and brainstorm with more.”

The next automatica will take place from June 22 to 25, 2027. It will again be co-located with Laser World of Photonics—the World’s Leading Trade Fair with Congress for Photonics Components, Systems and Applications—and World of Quantum in Munich.