Verenigde Maakindustrie Oost

VMO has three key points for achieving greater synergy within the manufacturing industry in and outside Twente. Besides ‘smart industry’, these points are international market development and sharing knowledge and expertise for lifelong learning.

VMO guides and supports manufacturing companies every step of the way to smarter production processes. ‘Smart industry’ is the next step towards the extensive automation of production processes in the manufacturing industry. This will make production processes faster, more efficient, cheaper, more customised, and above all, more sustainable for a sustainable future. This will make the production of small series or even single pieces very easy. (Personalised) differentiation can also be applied within one production process. Market demand feeds these developments.

VMO guides and supports companies in and outside Twente when they take their first steps in exporting or when they are searching for new contacts abroad. This can be in Germany and other European countries, or even worldwide. VMO’s foreign sister organisations and foreign chambers of commerce are used for this purpose. Many international businesses fairs and missions are also visited. Manufacturing companies can register for these events, such as for the annual Hannover Messe in Germany.

Sharing knowledge and expertise for the purpose of lifelong learning is woven into all VMO activities. Target group-oriented services are used to stimulate this by organising meetings, courses, workshops and projects.

Policy groups within VMO assist manufacturing companies. One of these groups is the ‘Internationalisation’ policy group. The ‘HRM’ policy group advocates an age-conscious personnel policy for employees in the various phases of their lives and careers. Manufacturing companies also host each other during ‘Innovation Walks’. A moderator makes it possible for the host company to share their goals and bottlenecks with other entrepreneurs. This approach is also used internationally, between manufacturing companies from Germany and Twente, for example.

VMO works on a sustainable future together with other network organisations such as Technologie Kring Twente (Technology Circle Twente, TKT) in Enschede, Advanced Materials Manufacturing Oost-Nederland (AMMON) in Enschede and TechWise Twente in Hengelo.