On February 11, Messe Stuttgart has announced to move the trade show Vision to a biennial cycle with immediate effect. As a result, Vision 2013 has been cancelled and the next Vision show will take place only in 2014. With this decision Messe Stuttgart has reacted to the request for change voiced by many of the trade show exhibitors. The European Machine Vision Association (EMVA) as partner of Vision and representing machine vision enterprises with a wide variety in size, company type, product range and industry focus, has been involved in the process which after several months of intensive discussion now finally led to the cancelation of Vision 2013. The driving goal for this decision taken by Messe Stuttgart has been the continuation of the 25 years of success of the show, just celebrated in 2012. With the change in date from the traditional early November to a September event and the fact that some major players had already decided not to be present for the 2013 show, this continuation seemed to be in danger.

A cancelation of a show already announced to the visitors and already planned for by a significant number of exhibitors inevitably creates some problems. Although the Vision organizers have to be commended for not taking this decision lightly, in the decision process EMVA had been a strong promoter for a more smooth approach to change with a longer term planning cycle.