By Luca Pezzini, Secretary General of the European Lift Association 

When you think about the concept of technological innovation, standards may not naturally seem to go hand-in-hand. One might be forgiven for thinking that standards and regulations might stifle a company’s ability to innovate. But Dr. Gero Gschwendtner, a representative of the International Standards Organization (ISO), argues that standards and innovation can actually be a match made in heaven. The topic of innovation was just one of those under discussion when the members of the European Lift Association (ELA) were once again given the opportunity to meet in person and discuss the issues faced by the industry; an opportunity they had not had since before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic two years ago.  

The ELA General Assembly and Annual Conference, held on the 19th and 20th May in Frankfurt, was unified under the theme “Lifts and Escalators: a road to the future in a safe, digital and energy efficient world”. The association lived up to its slogan of being the voice of the European lift industry by welcoming around a hundred members from 24 national member associations across Europe, representatives from ELA’s Committees and Working Groups, as well as selected members of the press and invited guests. The ELA General Assembly was hosted by the VDMA Lifts and Escalators, which represents the interests of the German elevator industry.  

Roberto Zappa, ELA President

After two years of interruption, due to Covid, there was finally a considerable physical presence at the conference dedicated to the most relevant topics for the lift industry: the focus on safety principles, the impact of digitisation and the need to pursue energy- efficient processes. 

After the opening remarks were delivered by ELA’s President, Roberto Zappa, representatives of European institutions offered keynote addresses, including Nicola Beer, the Vice President of the European Parliament, Kerstin Jorna, the Director-General of the Directorate-General for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs at the European Commission, followed by Stefano Calzolari, President of the European Committee for Standardization (CEN). 

Boosting the innovation factor

In order to ensure safety for lifts, escalators and moving walkways, compliance with codes and standards is a must. But in such a regulated environment, how can lift manufacturers be innovative and come up with new technologies and ideas to make their products and services greener and more digital? This was the focus of the first session. 

For Calzolari, integrating industry with the innovation community is essential to allow innovations to be standardised as early as possible, and to allow European innovators to set the standards for the global market. According to the European standards expert, standards can be more tightly integrated through creating early connections with industry and research to anticipate their needs and create sustainable synergies with the research and innovation community to identify new topics for standardization in advance. 

Gschwendtner, who is chairman of ISO/TC 178 (Lifts, escalators and moving walks) next offered up a practical approach to integrating standards with innovation in the lift industry: Technology Readiness Levels (TRLs). Originally developed at NASA in 1974 and used initially in the space industry, TRLs are a type of measurement system used to assess the maturity level of a particular technology. Many companies now use this process as the basis for their own development process, as it offers a common understanding of technology status and risk management, and is recognized as a basis for decisions concerning technology funding and the transition of technology. 

Towards a secure digital future

In the second session on digitalization and cybersecurity, discussions centered around communication and IoT standards for the lift industry. A representative from the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI), Dr. Enrico Scarrone, outlined a vision of interoperability for the smart lift IoT ecosystem that would enable lifts to play an important role in the development of smart buildings in smart cities. Through the oneM2M open global standard, smart lifts could offer real-time operation data for control rooms and building managers, and enable technological advances for lifts such as augmented reality and intelligent services. 

The Secretary General of the China Elevator Association (CEA), Lexiang Zhang, also offered ELA members valuable insights on the achievements and ongoing challenges of implementing digitalization and IoT in the huge lift industry in mainland China. Zhang outlined a proposal for future cooperation between ELA and CEA, including the unification and standardization of component names and terms, BIM and twin modelling, and the digitalization of current regulations, laws, standards and codes to incorporate the standards into design software to enable digital certification. 

Tackling the construction industry’s carbon footprint

In the session focusing on energy efficiency, the presentation from Gusts Kossovičs, Director of Technical communication at European Building Automation and Controls Association (eu.bac) was particularly impressive. According to a recent study, 20% of the energy consumed by European buildings is wasted, which amounts to approximately € 270 billion every year. Kossovičs outlined how energy efficiency and sustainability in every building can be achieved through the optimal application of home and building automation and controls (BACS). 

A cost-effective technology, BACS offers a fast payback time of an average of 3 years and reduces wasted thermal and electrical energy. 

Auf wiedersehen… until next year

Once again, the contributions offered by the ELA experts and invited speakers were well received by the attending member representatives, who held lively discussions and debates on the topics presented. Participants also had the opportunity to be updated on the important results achieved by the Association’s respective committees and working groups. Special awards were presented to the Lift and Escalator Industry Association (LEIA) of the UK and the French Fédération des Ascenseurs (FAS), for their performance in 2021. The evening ended with a traditional and well-deserved gala dinner at the Logenhaus zur Einigkeit.  

The contributions of the prestigious speakers are available on the ELA website, to whom we extend our heartfelt thanks. To view the agenda and individual presentations of the speakers, please visit https://www.ela-aisbl.eu/index.php/infodesk/general-assemblies.