Zuken Innovation World 2019 – A New Era of Events

A truly innovative event experience. You haven’t seen anything like this before and neither have we!

In this blog post we’ll tell you everything about the event itself and how we transformed the whole experience using tablets and the teamwork software CollaBoard.

What is the Zuken Innovation World?

The Zuken Innovation World is a series of annual global conferences that bring together Zuken’s customers, partners and industry professionals for networking, learning and sharing of innovative ideas. This year’s Swiss edition took place on June 25th in Lucerne, Switzerland, where we attended the event. From current Zuken customers and experts to digitization specialists, many interesting people came together for one day.

In the morning, several experts presented their knowledge about a certain topic or shared general news. For example, there has been a presentation about electro-engineering.

In the afternoon, the main block of the event started. There was set up a circuit through the event’s main hall. At the entrance of the main hall, a large interactive display was placed. It displayed an overview of the hall with different stations. Split in multiple groups of 8 people, every group received a tablet with the same project as the large interactive display on it.

The interactive circuit

With the application-based tool CollaBoard it is possible to work in the same project on multiple location-independent devices. Hence, every group joined the same pre-built project and then started the circuit.

In the project there was a question for every single station of the circuit. For example, at the manufacturing station the question was “do you also work paperless?”. Each team answered on their tablet using the pen, inking directly on the background or creating a sticky note. At some stations they took pictures, too.

All the answers then were displayed on the other tablets and at the large interactive display in the front of the main hall. So, during the course of the day, the project became more and more full of experiences, statements and knowledge. The great thing is, that even after the event, everyone can access the project, reflect the day and learn for the future.

The teamwork experience

As mentioned before, the event attendees were split in groups of 8. Every group received a tablet and had to answer the questions to each station. Naturally, the groups had to work together and reach a consensus on what they were going to answer.

Additionally, there has been a second kind of teamwork between the groups. By working in the same project, they saw the answers and pictures of other groups in real-time. Not only was that a competitive motivation, but also interesting to learn how other groups approach a question.

The shared CollaBoard project allowed the ca. 100 attendees to develop group dynamics really quickly. Although they haven’t had the chance to talk to everyone, they have been working towards the same goal during the whole afternoon and thus connected in a new way.

Simultaneously, the attendees got to know a very innovative software with a natural approach to modern technology. Other than just looking at innovations like at “normal” events, they got to use it during the whole occasion. That’s a great way to getting familiar with it in an entertaining way and also to provide use cases directly.


Tobias Martin, Operations Manager Zuken Switzerland, says:

At our yearly customer event we wanted to highlight an up-to-date topic and found the perfect solution with CollaBoard. With CollaBoard we were able to let collaborative teamwork in the digital age influence our customer event. It provided the ideal platform to develop ideas quickly, give feedback and ask questions about the stations.
Using different input devices like the SurfaceGo or the large SmartBoard, our customers got to know the true promise of cutting-edge, collaborative teamwork.


How can YOU organize an event like this?

Let’s be honest, some events are really boring and the only reason you go there, is for networking purposes. That can be changed! By including the attendees and giving them a challenge, you can change the entire event experience. They are going to remember this event for years.

There are three things you need for an innovative, digitized teamwork event:

  1. A fast and stable Wi-Fi connection, otherwise the software won’t run and you cannot browse.
  2. Tablets for individuals or groups, depending on the number of attendees.
  3. A large touchscreen to put in the middle of the room for general orientation and an overview of the event. Also nice to try out for people, who haven’t used interactive displays, yet.

IBV can provide the hard- and the software. So if you are interested in organizing such an event, feel free to contact us. We are more than happy to support innovative ideas for a more digitized business world.