Festo Didactic Showcases Technical Education and Training at Hannover Messe 2025
May 20, 2025
By Krystie Johnston
Hannover Messe 2025 was an extra special event for Festo. The Festo Group celebrated their 100th anniversary, Festo Canada celebrated their 50th anniversary, and Festo Didactic celebrated their 60th anniversary. Festo Didactic, the education arm of the company, understands how important education is for empowering individuals, driving economic growth, and promoting social progress.
Greg James, Sales Manager at Festo Didactic North America, has been with the company for more than 26 years, with more than half of those years at Festo Didactic. Upon returning from one of the world’s largest trade fairs, he shares insights into Hannover Messe and highlights the importance of competitions and continuous learning.
The importance of education and its application through competition
As part of their participation at Hannover, Festo Didactic partnered with NGen and Humber Polytechnic to feature a mechatronics skills competition. Two students and support staff from Humber Polytechnic, Conestoga College, and the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology (SAIT) travelled to Hannover to compete with a pair of students from Germany –like a World Skills competition – with the goal of demonstrating their skills in a friendly challenge.
“Canada was the host country for Hannover this year. And the CEO of NGen, Jayson Myers, really wanted to highlight and display our capabilities in mechatronics,” says James. “And what better way to do that than to host a friendly competition, with three teams from Canada. We had Conestoga College, SAIT, and Humber. We competed against the German team, which is the team that is going to EuroSkills from Germany.” James says a lot of planning went into the event: from planning the people, equipment, and tasks for the competition to arranging travel.
The competition was an opportunity to illustrate Canada’s capabilities and how well our education programs support manufacturing in Canada by engaging three of the country’s higher-level schools in automation and robotics programs at the fair. James says that NGen was instrumental in making the competition a success. “None of this could have happened without NGen. They were the advocates behind this. They provided funding for the event. It was a great collaboration between NGen and Festo and Humber, who were the official organizers of the event. A big shout out to Peter Wawrow from NGen. I cannot say enough good things about the NGen folks.”
Canada takes a leading role at Hannover
As the partner country of Hannover this year, Canada took on a leading role in highlighting their technological strengths, innovations, and investment opportunities to a global audience. James has attended the fair in the past, but he says this year was special.
“One of my main takeaways was that I was extremely proud to see the presence Canada had at Hannover Messe. I have been there with other host countries, and I really felt that Canada stepped up. We had a presence. There were a lot of Canadian colleges and universities. And there were a lot of Canadian companies.”
Coincidentally, visitors to the Didactic booth were able to explore the Festo Group’s featured products and solutions, and vice versa, as both booths were adjacent to each other. Festo’s presence was like a mini city within the approximate 500,000 square-meter fair. “It was a great opportunity,” says James. “When we had educational customers visit the booth, our team was able to quickly transition them across the floor to show them how the equipment is used in a real situation. So that was great.”
Festo Didactic received a lot of attention from notable visitors. James says their competition ran the entire week; from Monday to Friday, the students completed tasks throughout the day. This gave plenty of opportunity for delegates like the Chancellor of Germany, Olaf Scholz, and Dr. Wilfred Stoll, one of the owners of Festo. “Wilfred Stoll showed up with several members of the family to greet the teams. He is a strong advocate for skills and supporting skills competitions, so he was really pleased to see what we were doing at Hannover Messe.”
James says that the tasks that the competitors had to do were designed to highlight individual skills that are in demand for careers in mechatronics, automation, and robotics. “We presented them with a task every single morning; it was unknown to them as they walked in what was expected on them that day,” says James. “As they progressed through the week, they created all these different modules that built up to the final run on Friday. We were really pleased to see that all four teams were able to complete the task. It was impressive to see the results. They did a fantastic job commissioning their systems.”
Continuous learning goes beyond educational institutions
For those unfamiliar with Festo Didactic, they also support continuous education beyond post-secondary institutions. Acting on their belief that education is one of the most important economic resources today, they also provide training and education for the industrial sector and their own employees. Based on their Didactic principles, Festo’s LX learning centres enable companies and individuals to support their continuous learning and earn course certificates.
James says that this component to Festo Didactic received a lot of positive attention at Hannover. “A lot of companies are doing workforce development. They do not have their own learning management systems, and Festo LX gives them not only access to content but really provides access to manage their own in-house workforce development activity,” explains James.
He adds that visitors to Hannover were interested to learn more about how these platforms support the growing need to train and upskill new and existing employees. “It was pretty much occupied every time I went by the Festo Didactic portion of the booth.”
The past, present, and future of innovation at Festo
Another notable demonstration from Festo was their “Incredible Machine.” It drew attention from all types of visitors and was invaluable in highlighting the history and capabilities of the company. Bianca Accorsi, Corporate Communications Specialist at Festo Canada, was also at Hannover with the company. “It was nice to display Festo’s innovations and show people the Incredible Machine. Each one of the cells of the Incredible Machine has a part of the history of Festo, so it was nice to see the beginning of Festo, to the present, and what we want to achieve in the future. We want to have a long partnership – not only these past one hundred years, but for the next one hundred years to come.”
The future of automation will be easier to navigate when aligned with trusted partners that invest in knowledge, skills, and innovation. As leaders in technical education and training, Festo Didactic understands what it takes to be competitive in the future. Not only did the students compete at the fair to demonstrate their knowledge and experience, but they also explored the show to learn more about Industry 4.0, Industry 5.0, and Industry 6.0. “We put them on centre state of the NGen Pavillion on Thursday morning to present what they discovered on Wednesday afternoon.”
This was a fantastic opportunity for the competitors to go beyond a traditional skills competition. Having the ability to do research and gather information on where the industry is headed – and present it – is invaluable to their learning. “We asked them to tell us the difference between 4.0, 5.0, and 6.0. And many of them did an excellent job aligning it accordingly,” says James. “It was an interesting exercise, and it made us all reflect where we are in the evolution here in Canda and manufacturing in general. I think we have a lot of work to do before we get to 6.0 across the board, so it is going t be exciting times over the next 10 years.”
More Information
Interested in learning more about Festo? You can visit their website, check out their Didactics, or contact them with your questions today.
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Festo Didactic at the Forefront of Developing Canada’s Future Work Force
With Canadian manufacturing suffering from a growing labour shortage, the participation of industry in skills development is emerging as a vital component in hiring and retention. The needs are stark: The Canadian Exporters and Manufacturers Association says almost 40% of its members have jobs they can’t fill. Five years from now, 60% expect to be short-staffed, especially when it comes to skilled trades. Statistics Canada forecasts the country’s labour force growth rate will remain below 0.2% for the rest of the decade, below replacement levels.
This growing shortage is affecting companies of all sizes. Already, some manufacturers acknowledge losing out on contracts because they can’t find the manpower to fulfill them.
In reality, the challenge is two-fold: to replenish and expand the workforce to help close the gap between the number of job seekers and vacancies through 2030 when the last baby boomers reach age 65, and ensure workers get opportunities throughout their careers to upgrade or add to their skillset as current technologies evolve and new ones emerge. Festo, through Festo Didactic, one of the world leading provider of equipment and solutions for technical education, intends to help Canada meet this challenge on both fronts. In essence, the approach Festo has always taken is that the learning never stops.
