— By Plasteurope.com correspondent — 

Messe Düsseldorf (www.messe-duesseldorf.com), the organiser of the K 2025 trade fair, has highlighted “Embracing Digitalisation” as one of the three central themes of the world’s leading plastics and rubber trade fair, alongside circular economy and social responsibility.

Under the overarching motto “The Power of Plastics! Green – Smart – Responsible,” the event will take place from 8-15 October 2025 in Düsseldorf, Germany.

The event organisers said the plastics industry faces rising competitive pressure, stricter environmental regulations, and higher demands made on circularity. This environment increases the pressure to innovate during major economic and regulatory disruptions worldwide, it added.

Related: EU Commission introduces Compass for Competitiveness

The Embracing Digitalisation theme centres on enhancing efficiency and innovation through the deployment of digital technologies, Messe Düsseldorf said.

The implementation and use of artificial intelligence (AI), digital technologies that provide control and connectivity of machines to form the basis for innovative technologies, and AI-assisted automation and quality control represent a direction of focus.

Digitalisation can make industry gains with data generation, data capture, and data control, according to Ulrich Reifenhäuser, chairman of the advisory board at K.

The use of cyber-physical systems (CPS) – which allow plants, machinery, and individual work pieces to continuously exchange information – the Internet of things (IoT), and digital product passports (DPP) for plastics can capture and evaluate production data seamlessly in real time. Data and values can be shared and transmitted by the OPC UA communication standard to cloud applications, according to the trade show organiser.

Related: First DIN standard for PA waste, recyclate includes digital product passport

It noted that the EU Data Act that entered into force in January 2024 created clarity regarding data use as it “obliges machinery manufacturers to provide machine users with data generated during operation in a simple and understandable, machine-readable way.”

Fully automated manufacturing processes can be optimised with AI, using self-learning algorithms and machine learning to accelerate development cycles and improve process control. Complying with DPP requirements, a digital twin – or virtual depiction of a production line – can also streamline manufacturing processes and ease maintenance strategies, the trade show organisers said.

AI is also digitising optical quality control and material sorting. Quality assurance camera systems and AI-based image processing allow early defect detection during production to ensure consistent quality levels.

Related: Tomra launches industry-first food-grade sorting tech with object recognition

The trade organisers added that AI-assisted sorting systems with near-IR sensors are taking centre stage to increase reuse rates of material by separating high-quality fractions from impurities to improve recyclate quality.

Will the industry up its investment and interest in digitalisation and AI? The K show organisers cite a study by German research company Bitkom (Berlin; www.bitkom-research.de) that describes broad consensus among industrial companies on the relevance of digitalisation. At the same time, the researchers found that many firms are hesitant to implement it in practice.

The study reported 78% of industrial companies polled view AI as decisive for their competitiveness, while more than half are waiting to see how others get on first. At the same time 48% of companies polled say that they lack the necessary AI skills, while 91% demand fewer regulatory obstacles that can hamper AI innovation.

According to European economic research institute ZEW (Mannheim, Germany; www.zew.de), the plastics industry invests EUR 2.2 bn in innovation – only 1.65% of the innovation expenditure of the processing industry as a whole.

That being said, ZEW noted that 63% of the industry’s companies are moving forward with product or process innovations, exceeding the average of 57% in the processing trade.

“These figures illustrate that there is a will to innovate but financial and human resources are needed to consistently implement digitalisation projects,” Messe Düsseldorf concludes.

Related: EU Commission unveils Clean Industrial Deal in Brussels 

The K organiser said it expects the trade fair to attract more than 3,000 exhibitors from countries including Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, Turkey, the US, India, and Taiwan, with all eighteen exhibitor halls across the complex filled.

Plasteurope.com will again be joining the event with its own booth. Visit us at stand C 28 in Hall 6!