Industry 1.0 meets 4.0 - on February 13, 2019, the regional conference of the SME 4.0-Competence Center Augsburg took place in the Textile and Industry Museum. In a historical setting, the conference focused on the changes in the world of work and the significance of digitalization for manufacturing companies. More than 150 participants exchanged their experiences and learned about new technologies. Questions that concern medium-sized businesses: Where should companies start, and is digitalization paying off at all?

Being one of 25 competence centers in Germany, the SME 4.0-Competence Center Augsburg has the task of supporting small and medium-sized companies with free services for their digitalization. Training courses, technologies to try out, guidelines, or potential analyses provide Bavarian SMEs with the tools they need to master challenges such as shortage of skilled workers, cost pressure, and global competition.

Following the slogan "More time and money through digitalization? Listen to success stories - experience technologies - find solutions", interested parties had the opportunity at the regional conference to exchange views on current challenges, possibilities, and opportunities of digitalization for small and medium-sized companies and to test application examples for themselves. In addition to keynote speakers such as Stefan Schnorr, Head of the Digital and Innovation Policy Department at the Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy (BMWi), and Frank Rieger from the Chaos Computer Club, Norman Weiß, Managing Director of ME Industries, and Andrea Breiter from Schwan STABILO reported on what digitalization actually means for them. After a panel discussion with the speakers, the event participants were able to experience practical examples of digitalization for medium-sized businesses live in guided tours and workshops. For example, at the Fraunhofer IGCV, digitalization in assembly was demonstrated in the Learning Factory for Networked Production (LVP), and human-robot collaboration was made tangible in the Robot Technology Center.