AIEMA and ATC, for the first time, organised a consumer product exhibition for the benefit of employers and employees in the sports grounds of AIEMA TECHNOLOGY CENTRE during the year 1987-88. It was also as a fund raising event for ATC thanks to the initiatives of Mr K.S. SHETTY who was president of ATC at that time.

With a view to further achieving the objectives of AIEMA TECHNOLOGY CENTRE, Product Promotion Programmes were organized on a regular basis in the Silver Jubilee hall of ATC. The fair activities were also enlarged to BUYER SELLER MEETS and BANK CUSTOMERS MEETINGS with products display. This greatly helped in showcasing the manufacturing strength and profile of members and brought in the required recognition amongst the institutional buyers, corporate, Government establishments and nationalized Banks.

During the year 1993-94, Mr PR. Nagappan, Vice President of ATC, in charge of exhibitions and fund raising submitted a proposal for organising a full fledged industrial exhibition in Chennai under the name and style of ACMEE94, acronym for the five pavilions viz

The Proposal was well received by the ATC Executive Committee headed by Mr Thiagarajan and Past Presidents and other members

An advisory committee headed by Mr K. Vasudevan was constituted to guide in organizing this effort. All Past Presidents were included in the Committee as members. Also, to gain continuous momentum a Steering Committee headed by Mr.G.S Vijayaraghavan was formed. All ATC and AIEMA Committee members were members of this committee.Sub committees tor the five product specific pavilions, Marketing, Publicity, Ground Services etc. functioned with Mr PR.Nagappan as Convenor.

The very first effort of our association, ACMEE 94 got ITPO recognition and approval. With 230 stalls in the open Congress grounds ACMEE 94 was a resounding success … it was a long felt need in Chennai for a grand engineering exhibition. The professional visitor turn out proved to be a crucial point in the success of the exhibition.

The second event planned during June 1996 happened to be a challenging one because of unprecedented heavy rains and flood in the city on the second day of the exhibition forcing the organizers to extend the event by two days. The exhibitors as well as visitors were very happy at the turn out of business facilitated by ACMEE 96.

As the Congress Grounds were insufficient for meeting the expanded space requirements, ACMEE 98 was shifted to Rajaji Hall environs in the Government Estate, Chennai. ACMEE 2000 was held in Island Grounds.

All the three venues..Congress Grounds, Rajaji Hall Environs and Island Grounds were open areas and consequently, the ambience of exhibition was not upto the expectations. Keeping this fact, AIEMA took up the matter of construction of a proper exhibition complex in Chennai with various government authorities. AIEMA's efforts yielded fruits…in the form of Chennai Trade Centre..a modern exhibition facility in Chennai started functioning in 2001.

ACMEE 2002 happened to be the first industrial exhibition in the Chennai Trade Centre and since then the Chennai Trade Centre has been hosting ACMEE continuously once in two years. As the constructed halls are still inadequate, temporary halls are a regular feature in ACMEE events.

With each edition, ACMEE has been growing in all directions … number of participants, exhibition area, visitors and business transacted. Over the years, ACMEE has been specializing in manufacturing technology and is now recognized as a one stop platform for sourcing the best in machine tools available anywhere in the world. The event has also been getting international recognition and many international machine tools associations are participating.

ACMEE has been fortunate in getting guidance from leaders of the industry and support from all members For each edition of ACMEE, a separate Organising Committee has been guiding in organsing the event. The Committee takes care of all aspects of fair … from marketing the event amongst exhibitors to mobilizing visitors, publicity, actual organizing the event at site and so on. The names of Chairman and Convenors of each edition of ACMEE are given below.