Andrea Alboni, Universal Robots, succeeds his former colleague Helmut Schmid, who left the Executive Board last year. Martin Kullmann, ABB Robotics, succeeds Jörg Reger from ABB Robotics. Alexander Mühlens from igus in Cologne is the first member of the Management Board.

"We are delighted to welcome Andrea Alboni, Martin Kullmann and Alexander Mühlens, three new high-caliber experts, to our Board of Directors," says Volker Spanier, Chairman of the VDMA Robotics Executive Board. "The voluntary work in the VDMA Robotics Division with its around 100 members is more important than ever. We are currently observing a rapid technological development and are supporting small, medium-sized and large companies in exploiting the opportunities."

Andrea Alboni is General Manager of Universal Robots Western Europe in Munich and points to the enormous dynamism of the robotics and automation industry. As a specialist in collaborative lightweight robots, he helps to drive forward the development of human-robot collaboration as a board member of the VDMA Robotics Division.

Martin Kullmann is Head of Customer Service at ABB Robotics in Friedberg, Hesse, and emphasizes the further development of robotics in terms of safety as a topic for the future. The development of standards and expansion of application areas as well as closer cooperation between man and machine are further important topics in which Martin Kullmann will actively support the VDMA specialist department.

Alexander Mühlens is head of the Automation Technology and Robotics division at the Cologne-based company igus. He is looking forward to working with the strong VDMA network in the automation industry. He sees the industry's competitiveness in the new, rapidly growing automation markets as the greatest challenge. This is precisely where it is important to provide impetus and shape the future with the VDMA.