Doug Woods, President, AMT – The Association For Manufacturing Technology, sheds light on the transformative potential of IMTEX 2025 & ToolTech 2025, the evolving trends, the rise of smart manufacturing, and the immense opportunities for global partnerships that these events foster.
According to Woods, IMTEX 2025 & ToolTech 2025 will build upon the success of the manufacturing technology events held in 2024. “These events have highlighted a strong interest in exploring the latest advancements in manufacturing solutions, while also providing a platform for networking with industry leaders and peers. Attendees value the opportunity to exchange ideas, learn new techniques, and identify potential partnerships or collaborations,” he notes.
The immense size of the Indian market, coupled with rapid growth in manufacturing technologies, has generated significant excitement among investors. “With a population of nearly 1.4 billion, the Indian market presents vast potential, attracting investors eager to expand their presence in India and collaborate with innovative Indian manufacturing technology companies to drive business growth on a global scale,” he adds.
Upping the Manufacturing Game
When asked what trends in metal cutting technology will raise the manufacturing bar in the coming days, he replies, “Starting with the tooling, we see continued acceleration and integration of advanced materials like CBN, PCD and ceramics which provide superior hardness and wear resistance allowing for higher cutting speeds and improved surface finishes and accuracies.”
At the machine level, he points out numerous trends improving performance such as integrated automation, in situ sensor and metrology systems, enhanced UI/UX HMIs, optimized power usage features, and embedded AI provided real-time analytics.
Sharing his views on how Smart Manufacturing can transform the future of manufacturing in terms of the adoption of digitization, automation and robotics, he suggests considering the broader context. Having spent 40 years in the manufacturing technology field, he is confident that manufacturing has always been digital to some degree, with the available technologies of their time considered ‘smart’. “However, we are now experiencing a significant leap in digital manufacturing capabilities, driven by advancements in IIOT, cloud computing, 5G connectivity, open standards, more reliable and affordable sensors, graphical processors, and similar technologies. These developments have transformed the concept of ‘digital manufacturing’, making it vastly more powerful, scalable, and practical compared to a decade ago,” he adds.
According to him, Smart Manufacturing, at its core, is the result of leveraging these cutting-edge advancements in digital manufacturing. Today, businesses have access to a wide range of innovative technologies, such as additive manufacturing, artificial intelligence, machine learning, augmented and virtual reality, generative design, advanced robotics and cobots, digital twins, edge computing, integrated learning systems, and even blockchain. “The key challenge lies in simplifying these tools and ensuring they are accessible and well-understood by end users, a goal that can be significantly advanced through platforms like IMTEX,” he adds further.
With a population of nearly 1.4 billion, the Indian market presents vast potential, attracting investors eager to expand their presence in India and collaborate with innovative Indian manufacturing technology companies to drive business growth on a global scale. |
US Companies’ Partaking in IMTEX 2025
“Based on what we know, there are more than 40 AMT Member companies participating in the show and we have about a dozen AMT members exhibiting in our AMT USA Pavilion located in Hall 1B,” Woods shares.
Most other members are exhibiting on their own through their Indian subsidiary and still others with their agents or distributors. “All these companies have made an investment and commitment to the local market and would like to increase their footprint in India and may be introducing new products during the show. Many are analyzing their sales channels in India and would be interested in talking to qualified distributors or agents,” he adds.
Sharing the tune of exports having taken place from US to India in 2023-2024 and imports from India to US in the Machine Tool sector, he reveals that according to Trade Data Monitor (TDM), the source AMT uses for global trade data, during the period from January 2022 to September 2024 India imported US$ 254 million worth of machine tools from the US. During this same period, India exported US$ 80 million to the US. “India consumes about US$ 3 billion of machine tools every year and over 60 percent of this is imported. With the US accounting for less than 10 percent of the imported manufacturing technology, there is plenty of room for American producers to expand and capitalize on the opportunities within the booming Manufacturing sector in India,” he concludes.
Doug Woods
President
AMT – The Association For Manufacturing Technology
AMT – The Association For Manufacturing Technology
www.amtonline.org
Hall & Stall: 1B/B-104A