EFESME members met in Brussels
On 21 June 2023, the EFESME Board and General Assembly were held in Brussels. The meetings, which took place in a hybrid format to allow for the participation of numerous members and technical experts, were an opportunity to take stock of the various activities carried out by the Federation from the technical, political and national levels with the initiatives of the members themselves, as well as to reason about EFESME's future activities in the months and years to come, in order to ensure continuous support for the European lift SMEs that the Federation represents.
During the Board meeting, members and technical experts were then able to talk about EFESME's presence at the working tables that matter most concerning European and international standardisation in our sector, with a special focus on CEN TC 10 - Passenger, goods and service lifts; to the joint CEN-CLC/JTC 13 'Cybersecurity and data protection' group; to ETSI Smart M2M and its ad-hoc working group for lifts, all at European level; and finally to ISO TC 178 - Lifts, escalators and moving walks at global level. Intensive standardisation work is taking place in all these working groups: where CEN TC 10 and ISO TC 178 are strongly engaged in the revision of EN 81-20 and EN 81-50, which will have crucial international implications, ETSI Smart M2M is addressing the potential and criticalities of the smart monsoon also within the lift industry.
The technical experts also explained to members how EFESME is contributing to the European Commission's expert groups on lifts and machinery, demonstrating the importance of the work the Federation is doing not only in the purely technical field, but also in providing the European Commission and its experts with information and data from SMEs themselves to develop policies and projects within the sector.
In addition, special attention was paid to the activities that EFESME members have developed at national level, with the examples brought by Spain (FEPYMA), with a series of conferences dedicated to the removal of barriers, not only architectural ones, and by Italy (ANACAM), with the National Assembly (moe info on the EFESME participation & the dedicated website - in Italian) organised as a meeting and comparison point for Italian lift SMEs. EFESME is always ready to support initiatives at national level and to participate in them in order to bring the European sphere closer to specific national situations.
The Board of Directors also saw the presence, with an opening presentation, of SBS - Small Business Standards, the association that protects and represents European SMEs within the European standardisation processes.
SBS is also one of EFESME's European partners, and the one with which it develops its various technical activities. SBS's support and collaboration have enabled the Federation to achieve important results for European lift SMEs over many years of joint activities, projects and events.
Finally, during the following General Assembly, EFESME and its members welcomed as an Observer the Swiss company Cobianchi, represented during the Assembly by its CEO, Rudolf Ramseier.
The afternoon saw EFESME's members visit the European Parliament, in order to get a better insight into the functioning of one of the European institutions, and to allow the various national representatives to better understand the Federation's European dimension and role in protecting and supporting small and medium-sized enterprises in the sector.
The EFESME Secretariat remains available for any questions and can be contacted by e-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and by phone: +32 2 230 74 14.
Following up on publication of the Machinery Regulation in the EU Official Journal last week, on June 29th, a corrigendum was published today - It mainly concerns applicability dates.
The Corrigendum is available here in all EU languages.
The new EU Machinery Regulation published in the OJEU
A new Observer within the Federation, always expanding to represent more and more European lift SMEs.
After the last Board of Directors and General Assembly, EFESME and its Members welcomed a new Observer within the Federation. Cobianchi, from Switzerland, is an SME with 15 employees, specialising in security and safety components.
According to the EFESME President, Massimo Bezzi, Cobianchi's presence as an observer could provide EFESME and its experts with new inputs and insights, also thanks to the decades of experience of this SME, actively involved in the European market.
Mr Rudolf Ramseier, CEO of Cobianchi, attended the EFESME General Assembly to present his company and answer to the questions from the EFESME.
According to Mr. Ramseier, being in EFESME is “It is a big honour for me to be accepted from the EFESME GA as an Observer.
More than 30 experience in the elevator market, leading Cobianchi Liftteile AG for 25 years and being active in different national and European associations for many years, it will be a big pleasure and new challenge for me to build bridges and being active in creating interfaces. This in constructive cooperation with other associations across markets, countries and continents for the benefit of the members from EFESME”.
To know more about Cobianchi, visit the website http://en.cobianchi.ch/. The address of Cobianchi is Weststrasse 16, 3672 Oberdiessbach, Switzerland.
EFESME and its Members welcome Cobianchi's entry as Observer, and look forward to a positive collaboration with a new point of view.
EFESME Board of Directors and General Assembly
The EFESME Members met to discuss the Federation’s activities, and how to continue to support lift SMEs, together.
During a particularly interesting meeting, the Members discussed the various activities in favour of small and medium-sized enterprises carried over the past six months, and planned the future ones to ensure comprehensive and tailor-made support for European lift SMEs: new events, articles, and meetings at national level will be announced soon.
On the technical side, the Members were able to discuss in detail the technical and standardisation work carried out by the EFESME experts within CEN-CENELEC, ETSI, and ISO, as well as with the European Commission, its expert groups, and NB-Ls.
EFESME also saw the Swiss company Cobianchi join the Federation in the role of Observer. Cobianchi's CEO, Mr. Rudolf Ramseier, attended EFESME's General Assembly to present his company and answer questions from Members, before being welcomed by the positive vote of the General Assembly and joining the Federation.
In addition, as the opening session of the Board of Directors, SBS - Small Business Standards was present with Mr. Andrea Raffaelli, the SBS lift experts coordinator, who gave an interesting presentation on the various projects it follows at European level with EFESME and its other members, to support European SMEs and create standards that are favourable to them.
EFESME and its Members are satisfied with the work they have done together, and fully committed to continuing together along a path of collaboration and support for and with lift SMEs.
EFESME-NAEC-EECMAI webinar "A comparison between the main lift standards in the US, the EU, and India" ~ Highlights
1. In developing the current standards in your country and in the related working groups:
1a. What is the average composition of members from different stakeholders?
1b. Is this composition affecting the outcome of standardisation activities?
2. How are your standards addressing the following topics?
2a. Availability of detailed indications on how to provide appropriate access to the different elevator equipment by the differently competent maintenance operators.
2b. Normative prescriptions for mandatory presence on site of:
• Special tools for rescue, maintenance, diagnostics, repairs.
• Instructions (including detailed plans for the whole lifecycle) for maintenance, repairs, adjustments & replacements.
3. As Association, do you offer to your associates any trainings for general and/or maintenance activities relevant to updates to the main (referenced) standards?
As can be seen from the questions, the event revolved around three main topics, which were then analysed in more detail thanks to questions from the audience: the composition of the WGs working on lift standardisation in the EU, the USA, and India; the accessibility of instructions for use and special tools (a crucial topic on which EFESME has been working on for years); and the importance and availability of training in order to be able to count on up-to-date and trained staff. These are key issues for the whole sector, but especially for the small and medium-sized enterprises that EFESME represents in Europe. During the webinar, lift SMEs were often one of the aspects addressed by the experts, demonstrating their fundamental role in all aspects of the lift industry - albeit with different elements depending on the reality in which they work.
At the organisers' behest, the webinar was a dialogue between the parties, so that lift standardisation and how it is evolving in Europe, the US, and India could be openly compared, always with an eye on how the various local processes will impact global standardisation, and vice versa. It was a dynamic event, a back-and-forth between the parties often enlivened by questions from the audience, which certainly helped to further define certain points of interest, especially regarding the future of standardisation.
There was great satisfaction on the part of EFESME, NAEC and EECMAI for this first webinar together - it is proof that by collaborating together we can achieve results that are not only important, but interesting and useful for the entities involved, their associates and all interested stakeholders.
EFESME would like to thank NAEC and EECMAI, their respective presidents Mr. John Tolar and Mr. Suraj Thodimarath, the experts and staff involved in organising this webinar, and hopes it will be the first in a series dedicated to learning more about not only lift standardisation in one own part of the world, but also abroad, so as to create opportunities and synergy for continuous improvement.
Unable to follow the event or interested in checking it again?
- The recording of the event is available HERE
- Mr. Paolo TATTOLI's presentation HERE
- Mr. TAK Mathews' presentation HERE
Do you have a question on the event? Contact us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.!
An occasion for dialogue: A comparison between the main lift standards in the US, the EU, and India
comparison between the main lift standards in the US, the EU and India!
On 17 November, EFESME participated in the event organised in Tenerife, Spain, by its member FEPYMA, the Spanish federation that defends the interests of lift SMEs in the territory through a number of local associations. The event took place during a day entirely dedicated to the topic of barriers and their removal.
One of the most interesting aspects was the meaning given to the term 'barriers' itself: not only architectural ones, the most obvious when using such a term in the lift sector, but also technological, content-related and linguistic ones, i.e. all those obstacles, whether large or small, that prevent lift SMEs from fully expressing their capabilities and potential.
EFESME participated with its European partner SBS - Small Business Standards in the second panel, organised around a round table with different stakeholders to discuss the role and importance in breaking down barriers of technical standards developed at European and international level for the sector. The Federation was represented by its Policy Advisor in Brussels, Ms. Elettra Bilibio, while SBS participated in the person of its Director General, Ms. Maitane Olabarria Uzquiano.
Ms. Bilibio and Ms. Olabarria Uzquiano, starting from two interconnected points of view, emphasised the fundamental role of standards in breaking down barriers that prevent SMEs from making the most of their creativity and skills. Linguistic, educational and content-based, and technological barriers can be broken down by well-written standards, so as to create, both at European and international level, a working environment that is welcoming and fair to SMEs, and to achieve a true level-playing field. This is a reasoning that does not only apply to the elevator sector, but to all of them - an extremely important consideration to keep in mind especially with regard to the role of standards in increasingly interlinked sectors.
The round table was the perfect opportunity for both EFESME and SBS to explain to the SMEs present the work that the two European associations are doing together in the various CEN-CENELEC, ETSI, and ISO working groups to ensure that the standards produced and published are as SME-friendly as possible. The cooperation between EFESME and SBS, which has been going on for many years now, allows the technical experts from the federations to attend technical meetings with the valuable support of SBS.
©FEPYMA
From left to right: Mr. José María Compagni Morales, FEPYMA coordinator; Mr. Vicente Fernández-Oliva, Head of Industrial Safety Service of the Canary Islands; Ms. Maitane Olabarria Uzquiano, SBS Director General; Ms. Elettra Bilibio, EFESME Policy Advisor.
After the greetings of FEPYMA President Doña Sara Fernández Yanes, the mayor of La Gancha, Don Antonio Hernández Domínguez, and Don Moisés Fernandez Yanes, the president of the Canary Islands lift industry association of SMEs (Ascana), the first panel addressed the strengths and opportunities for SMEs in the lift industry. Both are numerous, and define the very way in which European lift SMEs approach their daily work and use their creativity to overcome obstacles. On the basis of these strengths and opportunities, national as well as European level, exploiting the exchange of information and focusing on skills development, certainly strengthened by association activity and investment in emerging technologies, SMEs will continue to be real and important players within the industry.
After the second panel on the role of standardisation, the third panel addressed the issue of barriers in its most classic sense: the barrier that prevents accessibility, and the role that SMEs play in solving this problem. Part of the panel was rightly dedicated to the situation in Spain, with a special focus on the Canary Islands and Tenerife, the conference venue. Architectural barriers remain a huge problem for building accessibility and people's rights: lift SMEs, with their originality and the flexibility and customisation of their designs and machinery, are in the best position to make the most of existing regulations and contribute to solving this long-standing problem.
And the role of standards is not to be forgotten! EFESME experts are working to ensure that accessibility is always given due and proper consideration when developing new standards.
The last panel was dedicated to the presentation of two technical solutions for the sector developed by two Spanish companies, Nayar and Epic Power, which demonstrated the creativity of lift companies in developing innovative projects by making the most of the latest technologies, in a process of continuous research and evolution.
@FEPYMA
EFESME would like to thank FEPYMA for the invitation and the opportunity given to meet Spanish lift SMEs on the territory and in person. The event gave both EFESME and SBS the opportunity to speak directly with SMEs and discuss their expectations and difficulties, strengthening the virtuous circle of information exchange between the national level and the European sphere.
EFESME also hopes to organise more similar events with its other members in 2023 and in the years to come, so that it can continue to explore the issue of barriers and their removal by talking to lift SMEs around Europe.
EFESME Board of Directors and General Assembly
The latest meeting of the Board of Directors and General Assembly took place this week to close another successful year.
The last EFESME Board of Directors and General Assembly took place on December 20, and saw the Federation’s members engage in a series of interesting discussions on EFESME's 2022 results and activities, and on the future commitments for the year ahead and beyond.
The EFESME members reviewed all the activities, technical and political, carried out together over the past year in support of small and medium-sized enterprises in the sector. With the ongoing revision of both the Machinery Directive and some of the most important standards in the lift sector, both European and international, the work of the technical experts within the various working groups was the focus of particular attention during the meetings, and a source of important results for European lift SMEs.
In addition, the Directors and members expressed their interest in organising more events at a national level in 2023, building on the positive experience of the events already organised in the area in recent years.
The aim is to strengthen the collaboration between the Federation and the national level, and to get closer and closer to European lift SMEs in order to encourage an ever increasing dialogue and a virtuous exchange of information to provide them with the best possible support.
The EFESME Board of Directors and its Members, the team and the technical experts, and all its members want to look forward to 2023, so that they can continue to organise and carry out activities and work for and in support of European lift SMEs to the best of their abilities.
