ABB is a leader in power and automation technologies that enables utility and industry customers to improve performance while lowering environmental impact. The ABB Group of companies operates in around 100 countries and employs about 108,000 people. Of these, 650 are working for ABB Corporate Research to maintain and extend ABBs technology leadership in power and automation products, applications and services. The ABB Corporate Research Center in Ladenburg, Germany, is one of  seven ABB Research Centers worldwide.

Daimler is one of the world's leading automotive companies. Its passenger car brands include Maybach, Mercedes-Benz and smart. Commercial vehicles are produced under the Mercedes-Benz, Freightliner, Sterling, Western Star and Setra brands. Financial and other Automotive-related services are offered through Daimler Services. In 2006, with 365,753 employees, Daimler (together with Chrysler as DaimlerChrysler) achieved revenues of EUR151.5 billion. Daimler has a global workforce, an international shareholder base, a world-wide brand awareness, and a global outlook. The company strategy is based on four pillars: Global presence, a strong brand portfolio, a wide product range, and leadership in technology and innovation.

www.daimler.com

The KUKA Robot Group is a manufacturer and provider of all kinds of manufacturing and automation equipment. Starting from single industrial robots and leading up to complete production lines, KUKA provides solutions for very small and also big enterprises like complete car body-shop manufacturing lines.
Creativity, dynamism and innovation are required to implement these versatile and technologically demanding applications. These attributes are the key to economic success and market leadership. KUKA Robot Group knows the challenges facing both people and machines, understands its customers' requirements and is developing ideas to meet them.
AML helps KUKA to better integrate into the heterogenous tool landscape for the digital factory and provides a seamless information transport form the planning of a plant down to the shopfloor during production."

www.kuka.com

Siemens Automation and Drives (A&D), Nuremberg, Germany, is the worldwide leading supplier in this field. Products developed by A&D include standard products for the manufacturing and process industries and for the electrical installation industry as well as system solutions, for example for machine tools, and solutions for whole industries such as the automation of entire automobile factories or chemical plants. Supplementing this range of products and services, A&D also offers software for linking production and management (horizontal and vertical IT integration) and for optimizing production processes. A&D employs 70,528 people worldwide and in fiscal year 2006 (to September 30) earned a group profit of €1.572 billion on sales of €12.848 billion and orders of €14.108 billion.

www.siemens.com/automation

EDAG Group – Partner to the International Mobility Industry - The world’s largest independent development partner, the EDAG Group develops ready-for-production concepts and solutions to sustain mobility in the future. As EDAG is an all-round development partner for the international automotive industry, the development of complete modules, vehicles, derivatives and production plants is as much a part of our service portfolio as the construction of models and prototypes. Besides engineering services, EDAG offers to implement complete production systems for body in white construction and vehicle assembly, through to the (low-volume/series) production of modules and special vehicle series, from a single source. In 2009, the Group had turnover of more than 570 million euros, and employed a worldwide workforce of over 5,800.
www.edag.com

INPRO GmbH provides its shareholders with a competitive advantage through innovations in production technology. The core competences of INPRO are process simulation, production systems and information processes, manufacturing and automation technologies, coating and composite technologies, innovation management and technology watch.

http://www.inpro.de

The focus of the activities from ISI Automation is set on modern system solutions for the automation of production processes, material flows, crane systems and high bay warehouses, assembly and production lines, packing machines as well as logistics management, warehouse administration and stacker's leading systems
www.isi-automation.com

logi.cals - kirchner SOFT is an independent software development house which offers both open automation platforms and functional specification environments in accordance with a range of standards. logi.cals' products are used by leading engineering companies for functional specification, programming and in the running of large scale plants in manufacturing and processing industries.

www.logicals.com

Die netAllied GmbH hat es sich zur Aufgabe gemacht, Softwarelösungen zu entwickeln, die die Effizienz von Anlagenbauern sowie von Planungs- und Konstruktionsdienstleistern maximieren. Die Idee und die Notwendigkeit für die Lösungen der netAllied GmbH ergaben sich aus den bisher nicht genutzten Optimierungsmöglichkeiten, die aufgrund der Synergie zwischen modernen Informations- und Datenbanksystemen und CAD-Systemen aller Art entwickelt werden können.

www.netallied.de

Phoenix Contact is a leading manufacturer of components and system solutions for electrical engineering and electronics. Founded in Essen in 1923, the worldwide acting company today has more than 10,000 employees. Sales subsidiaries and partners provide service in close proximity to the customers in 80 countries.
www.phoenixcontact.com

Its current chairman Wolfgang Rücker founded the Rücker group of Wiesbaden, Germany, in 1970. It went public in 2000 and is now a leading globally active supplier of development engineering services to the aviation and automobile industries. Rücker AG employs over 2,500 people, nearly all engineers, at 35 locations in 18 countries. The company has offices close to every major client. This ensures direct personal contact and successful cooperation.
www.ruecker.de

Zühlke is a leading technology and consultancy company providing bespoke software solutions and product innovation. We advise, develop and integrate to efficiently deliver solutions of the highest quality. Our multidisciplinary teams adopt a holistic approach to creating solutions using state-of-the-art processes, methods and technologies. We are targeting safety critical or highly available products for industry automation, telecommunication, transportation, medical devices and life-sciences as well as company critical IT systems for the financial services industry. With over 4,000 projects to our credit over nearly 40 years we know how to achieve truly outstanding results for our clients by applying a fresh and unique blend of innovative thinking, experience and engineering discipline.

www.zuehlke.com

The control systems business unit develops selected control system components and implements total solutions for the production industry. This unit addresses the areas of: Production-planning and control, monitoring and control of production processes, determination and provision of production and plant parameters, assistant functions for service-supported production process control, construction and processing of recipes, specialized systems platforms for control system tasks.
With our control systems technology we provide total solutions from conceptualization and development to commissioning and subsequent servicing. This requires the highly specialized know-how of the systems integrator which our institute has developed through 30 years experience in the field of control technology with special emphasis on the implementation of control system applications in the production and process industries.
Our clients are producers and suppliers of control systems as well as control system users mainly in the car manufacturing, textile, and steel industries.
The clients using our control systems enhance the efficiency and quality of their production through higher transparency of the production process. The producers and suppliers of control systems gain a competitive edge through innovative solutions.

www.mes.fraunhofer.de

The Institut für Automation und Kommunikation Magdeburg (ifak) is an independent research institute. The institute carries out applied research in the fields of process control and automation technology, industrial communication, measurement and sensor technology, information management for automation and environmental systems, mechatronics and traffic and transport telematics. In around 70 projects annually, ranging from feasibility studies to complex development projects, ifak is a partner to industry and the local authority.

www.ifak.eu

www.uni-karlsruhe.de

The Otto von Guericke University of Magdeburg is a technical oriented institution. In the AutomationML project the University is represented by the Centre for Distributed Systems (CVS) which deals with the application of the latest software technologies within the area of control systems.
Works at the CVS are aimed at the development of distributed control systems based on distributed intelligence.

www.iaf-bg.ovgu.de/cvs

The University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU- Universidad del País Vasco/Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea) is the public university in the Basque It has campuses over the three provinces of the autonomous community. It is the main research institution in the Basque Country, carrying out 90% of the basic research made in that territory. The Faculty of Engineering is located in Bilbao. It is founded on 1897, and it covers a broad band of engineering fields. At present, it has eight different degrees in Engineering, the most important one being Industrial Engineering; this is the degree with which the Faculty was founded. Compared to the most common european degrees, its Industrial Engineering is quite close to Mechanical Engineering but it also covers Electrical Engineering and some aspects of Civil Engineering , Energetics and Design. There are six degrees which last five years: Industrial Engineering, Telecommunications Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Industrial Organization Engineering, Industrial Control Engineering and Electronics and Materials Engineering; and another two which are three years degrees, related to Telecommunications Engineering. There are also offering 15 specialised masters and PhD programmes. The Faculty of Engineering has very strong links with industry, with programmes with about 300 different companies, where students can perform internships; some of those companies fund special labs in the Faculty where R&D work is developed. A strong international programme with more than 100 universities in Europe, USA, Latin America and Asia it is also maintained.

www.ehu.es