After a two-year hiatus, the 2022 FEICA Conference and EXPO broke an all-time attendance record and celebrated the association’s 50th anniversary with the entire European and International adhesives and sealants community. This year's event was a celebration of the entire European adhesives and sealants industry getting together again for the first time since 2019, as well as FEICA’s milestone anniversary. It took place from September 14-16, 2022, and was held at the Grand Elysée Hotel in Hamburg, Germany.

Following two postponements due to the COVID-19 pandemic, more than 700 industry leaders from all over the world exchanged ideas, discussed today’s global challenges, and built opportunities for long-term growth. The Conference and EXPO brought together formulators, suppliers, distributors, service providers, and members of the academic community to Hamburg. An important event for the adhesive and sealant industry in Europe, the Conference and EXPO provided insights into all the key issues affecting the industry, such as sustainable growth, innovation, and digitalization.

This year’s Conference Business Forum, titled “Enabling a sustainable future,” explained how a viable and sustainable future will depend on a more efficient and circular use of resources, and showed how the adhesive and sealant industry is eager to contribute to solutions to meet this challenge. In addition to the Business Forum, parallel breakout sessions offered attendees a range of focus areas, such as food packaging, sustainability, hot melts, recycling, and bio-based building blocks for adhesives and sealants. These breakout sessions gave experts an opportunity to share their knowledge and allowed delegates to enjoy the maximum benefit of the conference by attending informative sessions relevant to their own spheres of interest.

The conference’s presentations ranged from “Food packaging adhesives” to “Realizing energy efficiency.” The FEICA Seminar, open to all FEICA members, addressed “A Business Perspective on Regulatory Challenges.” At the EXPO, 50 exhibitors displayed their latest developments. Two books commemorating FEICA’s 50^th anniversary were distributed at the event. The first, “50 Years FEICA,” featured the history of the association and the adhesive and sealant industry with photos and stories from FEICA’s archives. For the second publication, FEICA commissioned Dr. Bernd Mayer and Dr. Andreas Groß at the Fraunhofer IFAM to write a study titled “Adhesive Bonding Technology in the 21st Century – Synergy of Technological and Ecological Potentials.”

Guido Cami (Avisa), FEICA president, said, “A sustainable future, the theme of this event, created many opportunities for our important industry to help achieve a circular economy. Adhesives and sealants are everywhere, and they already make a multitude of items better and more efficient. This year’s epic and very successful event demonstrated that we are all working hard to make our products sustainable, recyclable, and repairable. FEICA 2022 clearly demonstrated how many innovations are already in the pipeline. These might be challenging times, but also exciting one.”

Kristel Ons, FEICA secretary general, added, “It was great to see everyone again after three years, and the conference and EXPO was buzzing with more than 700 registrants enthusiastically catching up. The event was also a celebration of 50 years of FEICA. Together with our members, we have been able to defend our industry for the past five decades and will certainly continue to do so for the next 50 years.”

For more information, visit: www.feica-conferences.com.