PCH Meetings · 2026

Agoris analysis · updated October 2026

Key takeaways

• PCH Meetings is not an aisle-based trade show but a business convention: over two days, suppliers and buyers from the pharmaceutical, chemical, petrochemical and gas industries go through 30-minute meetings scheduled in advance by the organiser, held on the supplier's stand.
• Scope displayed for 2026: equipment, processes, utilities, energy efficiency, decarbonisation and hydrogen.
• Next edition: the 22nd, on Wednesday 25 and Thursday 26 November 2026 at Double Mixte, in Villeurbanne, on the doorstep of Lyon.
• Organiser: abe (advanced business events), a company based in Boulogne-Billancourt that specialises in business conventions. No co-organiser.
• Annual frequency. The site's archives attest to an edition every year from 2017 to 2025, with the 22nd announced for 2026: in March until 2019, in November since 2020, the 2020 edition having been announced as entirely online.
• Same dates, same venue: Intermaintenance, a business convention dedicated to maintenance and also organised by abe, holds its 8th edition in parallel. PCH Meetings is the historic event; the two share a conference programme, and no joint figure is published.
• Free participation for buyers. For suppliers, packages with meetings from €4,300 to €6,700 excl. VAT, plus a mandatory €200 excl. VAT registration fee.
• No results report with figures is published. For information, the provisional supplier list of 18 September 2026 has 36 companies, and the buyers' list of 2 October 2026 has 71 entries.

Who exhibits

Typical profile

Suppliers are sorted into ten families: equipment builders and machine manufacturers; suppliers of technical components; engineering firms and industrial integrators; software and digital solutions vendors; suppliers of energy, utilities and energy efficiency; experts, consultants and technical centres; institutional bodies, training organisations and associations; specialists in packaging, conditioning and logistics; materials manufacturers and plastics processors; maintenance providers and subcontractors.

Suppliers and buyers describe their skills and their needs in one and the same skills-needs classification, which the organiser says ensures precise meetings and a shared technical language. Its main headings: production and processes; utilities, networks and production environment; energy efficiency and decarbonisation; hydrogen; packaging, conditioning and logistics; project management, consulting, expertise and training.

Notable exhibitors

The provisional 2026 supplier list, closed on 18 September 2026, lists 36 companies, 25 of which the list shows as being in France. They include players in automation and energy such as Rockwell Automation, Bouygues Energies & Services through its industrial maintenance business unit, Clarke Energy France or Dametis; makers of process and utilities equipment such as Kaeser Compresseurs, Flottweg France, Haver & Boecker, Filtration Group, GL Filtration or Exocell; engineering firms such as Ingenica or Foselev Process Solutions; software and digital solutions vendors such as Beeldi, Fracttal or YZAR.

The other eleven entries come from ten countries: Biazzi and Dr. Müller AG (Switzerland), Mankenberg (Germany), Gemaco (Belgium), Sisto Armaturen (Luxembourg), Therma Process (Netherlands), Fracttal (Spain), Spyrosoft (Poland), Nokia Solutions & Networks (Finland), Vespro (Turkey) and Sulzer Chemtech Middle East (Bahrain). The organiser describes this list as provisional.

The home page also publishes undated exhibitor testimonials, including Sofise, Suurmond, Riera Nadeu or Courtois SAS: they do not confirm their presence in 2026.

Who the buyers are

The roles the organiser cites include: maintenance management, technical or plant management, production, processes and methods, design office, technical purchasing, rotating machinery, automation and instrumentation, regulatory inspection; utilities and energy managers; decarbonisation, hydrogen, environment and QHSE managers; directors of operations, industrial performance, CAPEX and industrial transformation.

The provisional 2026 buyers' list, dated 2 October 2026, has 71 entries for 58 distinct company names (the same name can appear with several roles), with no individual's name: 47 from France, 13 from Algeria, 5 from Morocco, 3 from Tunisia and 3 from Switzerland. On the French side, entries include BASF France for its pharmaceutical solutions, bioMérieux, Elkem Silicones France for its Saint-Fons site, Sanofi and its Montpellier R&D site, Virbac France, Gambro Industries (Baxter group), Prayon, SNF, Vicat and LyondellBasell for the Compagnie Pétrochimique de Berre. Entries from the Maghreb include Sonatrach, Novo Nordisk Algérie, OCP Maintenance Solutions and the Tunisian national water exploitation and distribution company; those from Switzerland include DSM-Firmenich and Syngenta for its Monthey site.

The list mixes production sites and specifiers: design offices, architecture firms, consultants and integrators such as Egis or SPIE Industrie also appear on it as buyers.

Quality of the exchanges

Free participation comes with a written counterpart. The buyer undertakes to attend their meetings, to attend the conferences they have pre-registered for and not to cancel less than a month before the convention without arranging a replacement. Their registration form asks them to describe their projects and the investment amount envisaged; the form states that the more precise the information, the more targeted the meetings.

No independent audit of attendance is published. The testimonials displayed by the organiser, from both sides, stress the same points: short meetings that get straight to the point, targeted counterparts, a human-scale format.

Events & community

How the meetings work

Most of the work happens before the event, according to a published calendar:

• registration and an online presentation sheet, where the supplier details their skills and the buyer their needs; the sheet can be edited until Monday 19 October 2026;
• opening of the online technical catalogue on Wednesday 21 October 2026: everyone requests there the counterparts they want to meet, flags those they decline, states their availability and chooses their conferences, until Friday 6 November 2026;
• the personalised schedule of meetings and conferences is sent by e-mail on Wednesday 18 November 2026;
• on site, 30-minute meetings on individual stands, with the organising team able to fit in additional meetings.

Declines are only taken into account at the catalogue stage. On Wednesday 25 November, reception opens at 08:00, meetings and conferences fill the slots from 09:00 to 12:30 and from 14:00 to 18:30, lunch is served on site from 12:30 to 14:00, and a networking cocktail follows at 18:30. Thursday 26 November follows the same pattern until 17:30.

Conference programme

The 2026 programme is shared by PCH Meetings and Intermaintenance: 30-minute conferences, open to all participants. Wednesday is geared towards processes and energy: filtration and carbon footprint reduction with Filtration Group, industrial digital twins with YZAR, drift in effluent treatment at chemical and pharmaceutical sites with La Bonne Altitude, Aquastrat and an engineer from DSM-Firmenich, heat recovery on compressed air with Kaeser Compresseurs, decarbonisation of distillation based on a study by ALLICE, ergonomics of fluid transfer with Flux France and Praxys Ergonomie Conseil. It opens with a case study on condition monitoring of critical equipment in the minerals industry.

Thursday leans towards maintenance: energy and water management with Dametis, artificial intelligence applied to field data collection with Beeldi, AI assistants complementing CMMS (computerised maintenance management systems, known as GMAO in French) with Araïko, generative AI as a copilot for maintenance teams with Fracttal, then a decision grid on whether or not to change CMMS with Inoteam.

The conferences are included for suppliers and buyers registered for the meetings. A conference-only pass is sold at €200 excl. VAT per half-day without lunch, €350 excl. VAT per day and €450 excl. VAT for both days, lunches included. An exhibitor can run a conference for €800 excl. VAT, provided it is technical rather than commercial: the organiser validates it, with the possible support of a review committee.

Community & networks

Intermaintenance is the only associated event in 2026, with a joint stand package. From 2022 to 2025, WASTE Meetings, dedicated to recycling, treatment and recovery of waste, was also held on the same dates and at the same venue; it is no longer mentioned for 2026.

The 2026 press partners are Eureka Flash Info, Éléments Industriels, Industrie Pharma, Production Maintenance, La Gazette du Laboratoire, Laboratoire.com and Actulabo. The editor-in-chief of Eureka Flash Info is presented as the team's referent, advising it on drawing up the classifications and on finding suppliers. The Swiss cluster Cleantech Alps appears on the site's Partners page, with no year attached.

The organiser, abe, puts together business conventions, congresses and trade shows in aeronautics, automotive, chemicals, pharmaceuticals or packaging, in France and abroad; it notably organises AD2S in Mérignac.

On site: what you need to know

The 2026 edition is held at Double Mixte, 19 avenue Gaston Berger in Villeurbanne, on the La Doua scientific campus. The venue, opened in 1988 under the name Centre des congrès de Villeurbanne, advertises 10,000 m² of modular space.

By tram, lines T1 and T4 serve the Gaston Berger stop; the T1 also links the two SNCF stations. Metro lines A and B connect with the tram at Charpennes, and buses C17 and C26 stop nearby. The organiser places Part-Dieu station 10 minutes away and Lyon Saint-Exupéry airport 20 minutes away. An Air France and KLM discount code is available for the event, valid for travel from 18 November to 3 December 2026. Hotels are booked through Revolugo, the event's exclusive partner agency. A few parking spaces are reserved for exhibitors.

Exhibitors can access their stand on Tuesday 24 November from 16:00 to 19:00, then on Wednesday 25 from 08:00; equipment deliveries are possible from 24 November, and pick-up takes place on Thursday 26 from 16:00 to 19:00. Each stand is delivered with a spotlight rail, a table and chairs, carpet, a power socket, Wi-Fi access and a projecting sign; drilling into the partitions is forbidden.

How much it costs to exhibit

The organiser publishes its 2026 price list in the supplier order form. All packages are added to a mandatory €200 excl. VAT registration fee, which covers heating, electricity and furniture:

• Package 1, 4 m² stand for one person: €4,300 excl. VAT.
• Package 2, 6 m² stand for one person: €5,300 excl. VAT.
• Package 3, 12 m² stand for two people: €6,700 excl. VAT.
• Package 4 "DUO" PCH Meetings and Intermaintenance, two 4 m² stands side by side for two people and a joint schedule: €6,500 excl. VAT.
• Package 5, Workshop Area without meetings, 4 m² stand for two people, reserved for new customers and innovative SMEs and limited to five companies: €3,100 excl. VAT. The exhibitor appears in the catalogue without being able to request meetings, but can be approached by others.

The packages with meetings include the equipped stand, the catalogue listing, a two-day meeting schedule, access to the conferences, lunches, the permanent coffee break and the cocktail. They also include a quota of referral invitations, 300, 500 or 1,000 depending on the package, intended for prospects, reserved for the chemical and petrochemical industries and pharmaceutical laboratories for packages 1 to 3: abe covers their accommodation and reimburses their transport, on presentation of receipts, up to €100 for a French company and €150 for a foreign company.

Options: additional person €400 excl. VAT, additional presentation sheet €500 excl. VAT, logo on the website €300 excl. VAT, advertising on the website €150 excl. VAT, running a conference €800 excl. VAT, additional meeting schedule €1,700 excl. VAT (12 m² package only). Sponsorship ranges from €500 excl. VAT for a point-of-sale display near reception to €4,000 excl. VAT for the cocktail of 25 November. A 60% deposit accompanies the order; a cancellation 21 days or more before the event costs 40% of the amount, and the full amount after that.

For buyers, participation in the meeting format is free, with lunches, conferences and the cocktail included. The home page announces a travel and accommodation package that is covered; the 2026 form states that the free accommodation, one or two nights, and the flat-rate transport reimbursement, €100 for a company based in France and €150 abroad on presentation of receipts, are announced for registrations recorded before 30 April 2026; the home page does not repeat this deadline. A buyer invited through an exhibitor's referral has their accommodation covered. Participants from countries outside the European Union are subject to specific conditions, including for visas, to be checked with the organiser.

Preparing your visit

For the exhibitor

• Take care over the presentation sheet: it feeds the technical catalogue and determines how relevant the meetings are. It can be corrected until 19 October 2026.
• With the meeting-based packages, use the referral invitations to bring your own prospects: their accommodation is covered by the organiser.
• Choose the DUO package if the offer also speaks to maintenance managers in other sectors: a single schedule covers both conventions.
• Keep the Workshop package for a first foray: with no possibility of requesting meetings, it depends on requests from others.
• Bring a power strip, chains and hooks to dress the stand.

For the buyer

• Describe your projects precisely in the form, investment amount included: the targeting depends on it.
• Sort the requests at the catalogue stage, before 6 November 2026: it is the only window in which a decline is taken into account.
• Block out both days or the half-days declared: the schedule is built on these availabilities.
• If you are unavailable, name a replacement rather than cancelling less than a month before.

Policy & CSR initiatives

Decarbonisation is at the heart of the content: it appears in the classification alongside energy efficiency and hydrogen, and the 2026 programme devotes several conferences to it, from the carbon footprint of filtration to heat recovery and the decarbonisation of distillation. It is a programme theme, to be distinguished from a commitment on the event's own footprint.

On the organiser's side, abe publishes a page titled Nos actions RSE (Our CSR actions). Under the Environment heading, it mentions waste sorting at its business conventions and a preference for travel by train; under Suppliers, the use of caterers with a local approach and of local suppliers for audiovisual, furniture, security and cleaning; under Communication, printing with local providers, eco-design and digital display. No ISO 20121 certification or carbon footprint assessment for PCH Meetings is published.

Double Mixte, for its part, invites its visitors to favour public transport, cycling or kick scooters, with no certified initiative displayed.

How the event has evolved

Trajectory analysis

The calendar changed in 2020. Until 2019, the convention was held in March; the 16th edition, set for 25 and 26 November 2020, switched on 30 October 2020 to a 100% digital version in video meetings. The late-November slot has stuck ever since.

The venue alternates between two sites in Villeurbanne, on the doorstep of Lyon: Espace Tête d'Or in 2017 and 2018, then from 2021 to 2023, Double Mixte in 2019, then without interruption since 2024. The 2026 edition is the third in a row at Double Mixte.

The scope has widened in stages. The 2017 to 2022 editions spoke of equipment, processes, utilities, energy efficiency and renewable energies. The 2023 edition put forward energy sobriety and decarbonisation, 2024 hydrogen, and the 2025 edition added the gas industry to the pharmaceutical, chemical and petrochemical trio: the event's title has covered all four industries since.

The convention has also surrounded itself with sister events. Intermaintenance has been announced on the same dates and at the same venue since 2020, and WASTE Meetings joined them by 2022 at the latest; in 2026, only Intermaintenance remains, with a joint conference programme and stand package. The international outlook is longstanding: as early as the preparation of the 2017 edition, the organiser announced that it wanted to promote international buyers, with particular attention to Africa. Of the 71 entries on the provisional 2026 list, 21 come from Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia.

Without published results, growth cannot be measured. The only figure found dates from 2016: the organiser described the 2016 edition as a record, with more than thirty new buyers and more than 40% new exhibitors. The dates of the 2027 edition had not been announced at the time of writing.

All data that does not state its source comes from the organiser's website.

Unless otherwise stated, all factual data in this listing comes from the organiser's official website (pchmeetings.com).