Driving the future at the Drives Conference 2019

Danfoss Drives leadership team at the DC19

The city of Austin, TX is known for a lot of things – be it sports, Texan cuisine, or music events. But now, Austin is also known for having hosted the biggest and most important networking event in the drives industry, the Danfoss Drives Conference 2019. Centrally located in the state of Texas lies the innovative, progressive and green city with high ambitions regarding climate change. This made the capital city the perfect location for this year’s DC19. 

The two packed conference days in Austin have come to an end and we’ve parted with our conference attendees. Their heads were buzzing with new and exciting insights about drives and we hope they got what they came for:

“These are fast changing times facing the megatrends, and therefore there is a big need for new information and new solutions. During the DC we get this information and get a deep dive into the technologies of Danfoss and how they provide help to customers and help us helping our customers.” Susann Schubert, Gützold Elektrotechnik GmbH 

 

“I wanted to learn about what Danfoss is doing, about upcoming products and how we can better perform in the market place and of course perform better against competition.” Bill Utermohlen, CAL Industrial Sales South CO. INC.

At DC19, the overall theme was Drive! the Future and setting the tone for innovative, digital and sustainable use of the drive. Needless to say, many of the breakouts, innovation hubs and expert-to-expert talks centered around digitalization, electrification and hybrid solutions. And speaking of the future, the opening message from President of Danfoss Drives, Vesa Laisi, was clear:

“8% of our global electricity consumption can be saved by 2040 if every machine that would benefit from having an AC drive actually had one. Our modern lives depend on energy, so wasting even just a little of it is not an option. Applying drives where suitable is one of the keys to limiting global warming.”

The global megatrends affecting our industry were a major topic at this year’s conference, and Tuuli Sarvilinna, VP Business Development & Global Marketing, offered some comforting news:

“Danfoss Drives has never been more relevant in these megatrends. We can make a real difference in addressing as well as providing solutions to the megatrends posing the world’s biggest challenges – today, tomorrow and in the future.”

Danfoss Drives took the opportunity of introducing the ‘Meet, Listen, Act’ concept at the DC19, which is a concept designed to improve customers’ solutions and further collaboration with customers. ‘Meet, Listen, Act’ is a challenging project where we ask our customers what we can do better and then we promise to offer solutions to their challenges in just 100 days! This concept is a testament to the fact we want to and need to listen to our customers in order to become better at engineering tomorrow.

At the final conference day, our keynote speakers offered their take on the conference theme, Drive! the Future. They gave inspirational presentations on how to exploit the opportunities presented by digitalization and disrupt well-established industries by living and breathing innovation and fully using advancements in technology.

Over the two conference days, more than 50 speakers hosted 100+ breakout sessions. We had expert-to-expert sessions and customer voice sessions enabling 500 drives experts from across the globe to network and share their drives knowledge.

I’d like to thank everyone who attended the DC19. We’ve had so much fun sharing insights and experiences with everyone who came out to Austin to talk drives non-stop. Austin, it’s been a real pleasure!

Author: Thomas Thörewik, Senior Vice President, Global Sales & Services, Danfoss Drives