Editor's comment: Welcome back my friends!

There’s a flurry of tradeshow previews packed into this issue as the industry continues to get back to some form of normality. Along with regulars, such as the Farnborough Airshow, TCT3Sixty, Subcon Show and Advanced Engineering, a new event called Manufacturing & Engineering Week will make its debut bow.

What could be described as a ‘Heinz 57’ of tradeshows, Manufacturing & Engineering Week will provide a festival of innovation to showcase the very best that UK industry has to offer. Meanwhile, TCT 3Sixty will shine a light on the latest additive advances, whilst Subcon, the UK’s premier event dedicated to subcontract manufacturing buyers returns in June.

Elsewhere, the 13th edition of Advanced Engineering will showcase seven zones that show organisers, Easyfairs say will encompass the latest technologies and inspire cross-industry collaboration to push the UK’s engineering industry to new heights.

Finally, the premier event in the calendar, the Farnborough International Airshow returns after a lengthy hiatus to highlight its Aerospace Global Forum, a global platform that aims to champion change, drive immediate action and accelerate transition to the net-zero economy.

In its own way, each show will hope to offer a little bit of a lot of different manufacturing technologies. Each show will attempt to provide more than just the sum of its parts. Each show will arguably offer the very best opportunities to discover more about someone - or something - you didn’t know existed.

It’s said that variety is the spice of life and this sentiment can be applied to what many manufacturing tradeshows spin us every year. It’s a chance to shake off that post-pandemic insularity, get out and meet and greet the usual suspects roving the exhibition aisles, catch up, press the flesh and recount many fond memories. Welcome back my friends!