Last month, WELDNET joined its sister projects PreMETs and Weldify at Manufacturing Day 2026. The event, held annually in Vienna, Austria, is the leading event for the manufacturing industry during ViennaUP, the largest decentralised startup festival in Europe.
Hosted by EIT Manufacturing and attracting more than 500 participants from over 50 countries, Manufacturing Day brings together startups, key industrial players, investors, researchers, and experts to celebrate the achievements and potential of the European manufacturing industry.
Ready for Manufacturing Day
One of the highlights of Manufacturing Day 2026 was Keynote Speaker Prof. David A. Mindell, Professor of Aerospace Engineering at MIT. An expert on robotic navigation and human interactions with autonomous systems in air, sea, and space, he is also leading authority on the history of inventors, engineers, entrepreneurs, and workers within the great arcs of technological change.
Prof. Mindell shared insights from one of his books, The New Lunar Society, in a fascinating exploration of what lessons from the first industrial revolution might be key to understanding the next major shift in technology and ensuring that the future learns from the past.
Boost Up Manufacturing Innovation Award
Another highlight of Manufacturing Day was the BoostUp Manufacturing Innovation Award, which saw six startups (Deprotech, Factorymaker, OWASmooth, Proxima Stella, scopri.ai, and Sleeve) pitch their businesses for a chance to win a prize of €5,000 from the Vienna Business Agency.
Competition was fierce and the expert panel of judges from Wirtschaftsagentur Wien, EY, Round2 Capital Partners, and EIT Manufacturing grilled the startup representatives with questions.
Factorymaker giving their presentation
Ultimately, the award was given to Factorymaker and their AI-powered software for industrial plant design and optimization. Factorymaker’s platform automates production layout, building, and site planning workflows in a holistic workflow to enable faster, more cost-efficient, and sustainable factory planning. Judges were particularly impressed by the potential of Factorymaker to serve AI Data Centres.
The Future of Manufacturing
Whilst AI was a central theme of the event, it forms only one aspect of the future of manufacturing in Europe. WELDNET was part of the Project Expo, which highlighted different projects being run by EIT Manufacturing East, all of which contribute to the future of manufacturing in different ways. The Project Expo presented an opportunity to engage with curious visitors and tell them about the work the projects are doing.
The Project Expo
WELDNET shared a stage with PreMETs and WELDIFY, explaining how the projects work together to provide synergy and why providing high-quality training is vital to ensuring the workforce of the future is ready to produce the products of the future.
If you are interested in learning more, you can follow WELDIFY on Social Media:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/weldify-project/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/people/Weldify-EU-Project/61572605233417/
