The international success of German machine tool making is due to its innovative strength and technological effectiveness. Each year, six per cent of the industry’s turnover is invested in research and development. This is well above the average for the whole machine tool industry.

Technology therefore determines companies’ everyday activities. That goes for products as well as business processes. Aspects such as norms and regulations, management systems, patents and environmental requirements, etc., play an important role in the development and construction of machines tools. Here, company owners and technical directors have to be constantly up to date with the endless number of new regulations.

The VDW supports its members in finding their way through the bureaucratic jungle. It informs them regularly about current developments, represents its members at international negotiations on technical standards and health and safety regulations, and smoothes the way for them in international markets, also where non-tariff trade barriers have been erected in the form of regulations.