OI4 Alliance Realigns Itself, Profes­sion­al­izes After Having Founded New Entity

Reinach, Switzer­land, 13.12.2022 – The Open Industry 4.0 Alliance has reor­gan­ised itself as part of the annual general assembly held on 9 December 2022. Dr Chris­tian Liedtke, respon­sible for strategic alliances at KUKA, will take on the role of Chairman of the Board at the Alliance with imme­diate effect and will also act as spokesperson in this role. Hans Huber, Managing Director Indus­trial Internet of Things at Endress+Hauser, and Dr Marius Grath­wohl, Vice Pres­i­dent Digital Prod­ucts and Trans­for­ma­tion at MULTIVAC, will support Dr Chris­tian Liedtke as part of the Alliance’s Exec­u­tive Board. Nils Herzberg, former spokesperson of the Alliance and member of the Exec­u­tive Board, will leave SAP at the end of the year and thus relin­quish his role within the Alliance. He will be succeeded by Georg Kube, Global Vice Pres­i­dent at SAP, as a newly elected member of the Exec­u­tive Board. 

Open Industry 4.0 Alliance estab­lishes itself in Europe 

Since its foun­da­tion in April 2019, the Open Industry 4.0 Alliance has grown to more than 100 member compa­nies and is increas­ingly estab­lishing itself in Euro­pean industry circles as a “prac­ti­tioner and imple­men­ta­tion alliance”. With its new set-up, the Alliance will continue a consis­tent course of growth. The central building block is further inter­na­tion­al­i­sa­tion to support Euro­pean indus­tries in meeting global chal­lenges. Whether it is the EU Data Act, resilient supply chains, carbon foot­print reduc­tion or require­ments for the circular economy — the most urgent busi­ness and industry issues can only be addressed together, inter­na­tion­ally and in a network. 

“In 2023, the Alliance will enter a new phase,” says Dr Chris­tian Liedtke. “In partic­ular, we will continue to drive forward our inter­na­tion­al­i­sa­tion plans with an initial focus on Europe. After the successful launch in the Nether­lands, Denmark, Belgium and Italy will follow.” 

The Alliance is repli­cating its estab­lished model for Germany and the Nether­lands to support further inter­na­tion­al­i­sa­tion. In Denmark, the Alliance is already working with ministries, asso­ci­a­tions and research insti­tu­tions. “In addi­tion to the steady rate of inter­na­tion­al­i­sa­tion, the Alliance continues to inten­sify its coop­er­a­tion with German govern­mental organ­i­sa­tions, asso­ci­a­tions and feder­a­tions,” adds Dr Chris­tian Liedtke. 

Alliance pushes ahead with further profes­sion­al­i­sa­tion 

As part of its reor­gan­i­sa­tion, the Alliance is also under­taking further consol­i­da­tion which has seen the foun­da­tion of the Open Industry 4.0 Imple­men­ta­tion GmbH. The new service company has five full-time employees and Ekrem Yigit­doel has taken over the manage­ment of the GmbH in addi­tion to his func­tion as Managing Director of the asso­ci­a­tion. 

“The Alliance’s broad focus in many sectors and tech­nolo­gies has proven its worth. Our primary goal remains estab­lishing ourselves as an imple­men­ta­tion alliance of prac­ti­tioners,” says Ekrem Yigit­doel. “Today, most industry asso­ci­a­tions and stan­dard­i­s­a­tion bodies under­stand that we are not in compe­ti­tion with each other but comple­ment one another.” 

“The strengths of the Open Industry 4.0 Alliance are visibly perceived in the market and the Industry 4.0 commu­nity. I am there­fore very pleased to be able to actively support the further devel­op­ment and estab­lish­ment of the Open Industry 4.0 Alliance in Germany and inter­na­tion­ally, as a new board member,” says Georg Kube, Global Vice Pres­i­dent at SAP. “On behalf of the Alliance, I would also like to thank Nils Herzberg very much. He was the driving force in the founding phase and launch of the Alliance.” 

About the Open Industry 4.0 Alliance: 

The Open Industry 4.0 Alliance acts as a part­ner­ship asso­ci­a­tion of leading indus­trial compa­nies that prag­mat­i­cally partic­i­pate in the imple­men­ta­tion of cross-vendor industry 4.0 solu­tions and services for manu­fac­turing plants and auto­mated ware­houses. In industry and tech­nology working groups, industry experts develop use cases and imple­ment them tech­ni­cally based on the OI4 refer­ence archi­tec­ture. These solu­tions, along with imple­men­ta­tion guides, are shared in the commu­nity and made avail­able outside the Alliance. The Alliance was launched in April 2019. The seat of the asso­ci­a­tion is Reinach, Switzer­land. 

More infor­ma­tion: https://openindustry4.com/