Come April, some truly imaginative products, I mean really wonderful stuff, will walk away from the huge bauma show here in Munich as winners  of one of the event’s prestigious Innovation Awards.

I only have a list right now but details should be coming up. Standouts include (in the Design category) Kaiser’s Walking Mobile Excavator, which could be a relative of the Mars Curiosity rover,  a Liebherr compact loader and Wacker Neuson’s 100 demolition breaker.  In other categories eye catchers include Volvo Construction Equipment’s fume extraction system for asphalt pavers; Wirtgen’s 3D system for controlling offset slipform pavers; Aker Wirth’s Mobile Tunnel Miner; and Herrenknecht’s Pipe Express Tunneling System.–John Latta, Editor-in-Chief, Better Roads, reporting live from Munich, Germany, where it is still cold and windy with a little rain