Zu den Top-Speakern in der Congress-Area zählen unter anderem Petra Scharner-Wolff, Vorstandsvorsitzende der Otto Group, Jens H. Lund, Group CEO von DSV, Generalmajor Jochen Deuer, Kommandeur Logistikkommando der Bundeswehr, Arthur Valdez, vormals Amazon, Starbucks und Target, Ilse Henne, Vorständin bei der ThyssenKrupp AG und stellv. Chairwoman of BVL, Achim Puchert, CEO, Mercedes-Benz Trucks, Nadine Despineux, Head of Sales at Jungheinrich, Sebastian Peters, Chairman of the Board of Management at Airbus Operations, Prof. Dr.-Alice Kirchheim, Director of the Fraunhofer IML and Ashwin Bhat, CEO Lufthansa Cargo.

The highlight of the event will once again be the presentation of the German Logistics Award on Wednesday evening, followed by a varied networking night for the congress guests. All participants will then meet up on Thursday evening for the big CX party in the Expo Area.

Logistics sector: real growth not expected until 2026

Kai Althoff, Chairman of the BVL and CEO of 4flow, presented the current state of logistics in Germany. The logistics sector remains the third largest economic sector after trade and the automotive industry and has an economic output of around 335 billion euros, which corresponds to around eight percent of Germany's economic output and represents 25 percent of the European logistics market. These figures for 2024 can be found in the new Top100 study, which will be published for the first time in November by Heilbronn University under Prof. Martin Schwemmer with Deutscher Verkehrs-Verlag. According to the study, economic output has increased by 2.6% in nominal terms compared to 2023.

In 2024, logistics employment fell by around 60,000 to 3.35 million employees (-1.8%).

Fall forecast with three scenarios

Based on these figures, the logistics experts led by Prof. Christian Kille from the TH Würzburg-Schweinfurt have drawn up their autumn forecast, which is also being published today. Due to the uncertain framework conditions, they have calculated three scenarios - a best case scenario, a trend scenario and a worst case scenario. In 2025, the economic output of logistics would be between 337.7 and 338.7 billion euros in nominal terms, and 344.8 to 349.5 billion euros in 2026 (assumed development 2025: +0.8 to +1.1 %, 2026: +2.1 to 3.2 %). In real terms, however, this results in a decline of between -0.5 % and -0.8 % in 2025 and a range of -0.4 % to +1.1 % in 2026.

BVL Chairman Kai Althoff comments: "In my view, the middle scenario is the most likely in the logistics experts' forecasts. This means further stagnation in 2025 and only noticeable slight growth in 2026. This also corresponds with the results of our BVL Logistics Indicator, which we publish together with the ifo Institute. Here we see a slight recovery at a very low level, but not yet a real turnaround in business expectations. The development of logistics is in line with the overall economic development in Germany. As the third largest economic sector, logistics is of great importance for Germany and is an indicator of the overall economic situation."

New study "Trends and strategies in logistics and supply chain management"

The new study "Trends and Strategies in Logistics and Supply Chain Management" was also presented at the BVL Supply Chain CX on Wednesday. Cybersecurity and digitalization continue to be the top issues for companies (see separate press release). Only 6% of the companies surveyed agree with the statement that the logistics and supply chain management sector is adequately represented by politicians. 60% disagree and 34% are undecided.