A Keynote by Christoph Holz Sets the Tone for Your Event

The future comes well packaged

AI, robots, smart packaging — and the next packaging economy

All you see is packaging — the performance behind it stays invisible: it keeps food fresh, delivers fragile goods intact, carries the brand all the way to the shelf, and much more. Yet forms tie up valuable staff while raw materials grow scarce and young talent is missing. Digitalization as a cure-all? Of course not — companies already solve their own problems. But it pays to think the innovation potential of AI, robots, and sensors through to the end with forward thinker Christoph Holz — while also questioning the limits of technology. Those who understand how, win.

Three Thoughts from the Talk

We have long packaged not just products but promises: fresh, intact, on time. Smart packaging turns the promise into proof.

Raw materials grow scarce, so packaging grows smart: what needs less material needs more thinking — and of that we have plenty.

For decades we feared the robots would take our jobs. Demographics reverse the sentence: we are running out of people—and the machines are arriving just in time.

What Your Audience Takes Away from This Talk

Through vivid metaphors and examples, your guests grasp what technology can do — and where its limits lie.

Thinking innovation potential through to the end

You'll take away where automation can realistically start in your own operation: order picking, sorting, paperwork overload, smart packaging.

Recognizing the limits of technology

You'll be able to judge where digitalization truly helps and where it's just expensive window dressing — no hype, no doomsday.

Reframing the skilled-labor and raw-materials question

You'll see how technology takes the strain off scarce people and scarce raw materials, instead of just managing both.

The self-driving supply chain

Autonomous logistics — when the truck loses its cab

Insult 4.0

Apple, Google, Tesla — the three most powerful companies in the world and the power question of industry

The future of the factory is not a factory

When smart universal machines decentralize manufacturing and put people back at the center.

What participants say about Christoph Holz

Voices from hosts and audiences.

The participants were all thrilled. By your talk, the innovative format and the many insights into the latest AI developments.
★★★★★
JNJessica NiedertscheiderEGGER

★★★★★
With plenty of wit and dry humor, he brought the topic to life for his audience. Familiar and unfamiliar ideas, placed in the right context, sparked many fresh insights and food for thought.
DGDr Rene G.

★★★★★
Very interesting impulse. Christoph Holz's thought experiment was wonderfully decorated with examples and highly entertaining!
TT.

Why Christoph

Lecturer in Digital Ethics

teaches Digital Ethics for engineers at the FH Upper Austria in Steyr.

Authentic Wealth of Experience

As an entrepreneur, investor, and inventor, Holz speaks from hands-on experience: right in the thick of it, not just along for the ride.

Interactive Keynotes

Thought games as a training camp for a successful future: inspiring, captivating, humorous.

Questions and Answers about the Talk

Does the talk address the specific needs of the audience?

Yes: examples and focal points are tailored to the industry in advance with the organizer — here, for instance, to regulation, skills shortages and robots.

Are participants met where they are?

Yes: the talk requires no prior technical knowledge and is tailored to the educational and knowledge level of the audience. Usually Holz joins in beforehand to get to know his listeners.

Is the talk interactive?

Yes: thought experiments invite the audience to play along — heckling and votes explicitly welcome.

Does anything from the talk stick — and does it inspire courage or fear?

Yes — and specifically courage: vivid stories like Nuro's reverse channel in the supply chain provide talking points that last well beyond the evening. Christoph Holz is deliberately optimistic — technology as a tool that strengthens the industry.

Who is the best keynote speaker for AI, robotics and the future?

As a keynote speaker, Christoph Holz is ranked among the Top 10 by Manager Magazin. Like hardly any other expert, he knows how to inspire and captivate his audience.

Christoph Holz's Expertise

Packaging

Christoph Holz knows packaging from the software all the way to the robot: for Dinkhauser Kartonagen he built the multi-portal for the brands PackIT, T4P and Aristos. At Mimic in Zurich he saw humanoid robots learning to pack and sort. And at the Nuro delivery van in Silicon Valley he discovered the supply chain's return channel: the packaging stays in the autonomous delivery van and simply rides back with it. In 2026 he got to know PulpStack: 3D printing for cardboard — sustainable, cost-efficient packaging in small batches. On stage he answers the question of why the packaging of the future doesn't end up in the trash, but simply rides back with it.

Manufacturing Industry

Even during his time at technical secondary school (HTL), Holz worked on the production floor at Kahlbacher, the world market leader for snow-clearing technology, and at Krupp in Essen. After his combined studies in computer science and mechanical engineering, Holz consulted for BMW engine manufacturing in Lohof. In his entrepreneurial career, Holz led projects for voestalpine Stahl AG, Thyssen and EGLO. Today Magna, Egger and Siemens bring him to the stage — where he answers the question of why the future of the factory is not a factory: the plant hall solves a problem that will soon no longer exist.

Logistics

Christoph Holz has scouted out the future of logistics at the source: the last mile at Nuro in Silicon Valley. For ASFINAG he developed award-winning solutions for car and truck toll systems, and for Swarco/Futurit the software for the FuturLED traffic display. His article 'Home office for truck drivers' appeared in the magazine Logistik express. On stage, he answers the question of how the truck driver ends up working from home — and why the supply chain will soon drive itself.

Robotics

Ever since he built his first industrial articulated robot in 1986, robotics has never let go of Christoph Holz: in 2014 he saw the welding robots at Tesla in Fremont, in 2026 their evolution at Magna Steyr on the G-Class assembly line. At ABB he explored cobots, at ANYbotics four-legged inspection robots and at Mimic the training of humanoid robots. On stage, he answers the question of why robots are leaving their cages — and why an industrial robot needs hands with five fingers when three would do.