The 2016 edition of ISSA/INTERCLEAN has come and gone, held 10 to 13 May, and as expected the 30,289 visitors from 134 countries made the show a resounding success. As it was my first visit to what has been called ‘the world stage’ for the cleaning and hygiene industry, it was a comfort to see more than 40 familiar Australian and New Zealand faces among the halls of innovative machines, products and technology throughout the busy four days.
According to ISSA/INTERCLEAN the international share of attendees also keeps growing with 76 per cent of visitors coming from outside the Netherlands, with the largest growth from Oceania, Western Africa and Southeast Asia.
While it’s difficult in today’s technological age to define a truly ‘new’ and ‘innovative’ product, some of the major players threw their hat in the ring with some advancements and enhancements in software and robotic technology. This was highlighted at ISSA/INTERCLEAN’s InnovationLAB and Robot Arena – two areas dedicated solely to showcasing innovation’s found at this year’s show.
The 2016 winner of the Amsterdam Innovation Award was Sealed Air Diversey Care’s Augmented Reality: Suma Revoflow, which places Diversey ahead in the race towards the digital age. “This is exciting and inspiring technology that has not been seen in the professional cleaning sector before and it brings with it many opportunities and possibilities,” stated European Cleaning Journal’s Michelle Marshall, chair of the judging panel.
“There is no sustainable life without cleaning and hygiene; there are places in the world that have mobile phones but don’t have a working toilet,” stated Dr. Ilham Kadri of Sealed Air Diversey Care. “Connectivity is everywhere and we need to embrace it as we innovate. Our story is bigger than this, cleaning is invisible so the Internet of clean is imperative and we are happy to be seen as ‘disruptive innovators’.”
Robotics were back and better than before at this year’s show with the Robot RA 660 NAVI from Cleanfix winning the machinery category of the Innovation Awards. More compact than the Sealed Air Diversey Care’s Taski Intellibot, the Navi is equipped with a navigation system, three moisturisable cleaning brushes and a suction cup – the RA 660 Navi wipes and sucks autonomously.
With connected software for washrooms and patented fabric technologies for hotels to ergonomics tools to reduce workplace injury and the smallest and lightest compact vacuums and scrubbers – if there was something news to see in the cleaning industry, ISSA/INTERCLEAM Amsterdam was the place to see it. But you had to look; some of the greatest innovations were hiding deep in the halls of stands and had to be smoked out.
“The success of ISSA/INTERCLEAN Amsterdam was the great atmosphere throughout the RAI complex,” said Rob den Hertog, manager ISSA/INTERCLEAN at RAI Amsterdam. “From the Award Ceremony on the opening day of the show to the many business contacts on the exhibition floor, from the high degree of knowledge exchange at the complementary ISSA seminar programme and the innovations in the InnovationLAB to the networking fun at the various social gatherings, ISSA/INTERCLEAN was the place to be.”
For all show photos visit INCLEAN’s photo album
