Embedded World did not have an easy time of it this year, especially with the unfortunate timing. Until the start of the trade fair, it was not yet clear that the coronavirus would cause many organizers of later trade fairs to postpone their dates. So NürnbergMesse GmbH bravely went ahead with the event despite numerous exhibitors canceling. The influx of visitors was also dampened by carnival and the school vacations in many German states.

The whole thing in figures: Of over 1100 registered exhibitors, around 200 canceled. 13,800 visitors came to Nuremberg over the three days - almost half as many as last year. The exhibitors presented the entire value chain for embedded system technologies in Nuremberg.

Thomas Preutenborbeck, Member of the Management Board of NürnbergMesse, says: "In recent years, we have been able to report increasing visitor numbers at the end of the exhibition year after year. Unfortunately, we are not able to do that this year. The discussion surrounding exhibitor cancellations and the coronavirus has unsettled numerous exhibitors and visitors all over the world and had a major impact on Embedded World."

"On the one hand, we received messages from exhibitors who rated the trade fair as rather unsatisfactory for them, on the other hand, there was positive feedback from companies who were able to hold many valuable discussions during the three days," says Preutenborbeck. "Ultimately, more than 900 exhibitors and thousands of visitors came to Nuremberg. We would like to thank them for this, and of course we missed all those who did not or could not come."

Oliver Winzenried, CEO of licensing and security specialist Wibu-Systems, commented on the trade fair from the company's point of view: "Unfortunately, the number of leads we generated was only just under half the number of contacts we made last year. Of course, this meant that we did not achieve our goal for the trade fair. However, we were able to make more intensive contact with other exhibitors than would otherwise have been possible. We can certainly benefit from this too."