Align Technology Hosts 400 Doctors at 2026 Invisalign® EMEA Ortho Summit Featuring Digital Orthodontic Solutions Focused on Clinical Indications and Upcoming Align Innovations
- The Invisalign Specifix™ Attachment System,
- Invisalign® integrated buttons,
- Invisalign® Palatal Expander with integrated hook features, and
- Invisalign clear aligner custom trimline option
Align Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:ALGN), a leading global medical device company that designs, manufactures, and sells the Invisalign® System of clear aligners, iTero™ intraoral scanners, and exocad™ CAD/CAM software for digital orthodontics and restorative dentistry, today shared highlights of its 2026 Invisalign® EMEA Ortho Summit, which brought together approximately 400 orthodontists and dental professionals from across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA).
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260521046209/en/
Commenting on the 2026 Invisalign EMEA Ortho Summit, David Carr, Align Technology executive vice president and managing director, EMEA, said, "The Summit was designed to foster connection and collaboration with Invisalign providers. It was built around a simple idea: experience matters."
The three-day summit, held May 14–16, 2026 in Barcelona, Spain provided an immersive peer to peer learning experience focused on Align's next generation digital technologies. These innovations are designed to address the most complex clinical indications for kids, teens and adults, including Class II malocclusions, while improving treatment precision, practice efficiency, and the overall patient experience.
Commenting on the 2026 Invisalign EMEA Ortho Summit, David Carr, Align Technology executive vice president and managing director, EMEA, said, "The Summit was designed to foster connection and collaboration with Invisalign providers. It was built around a simple idea: experience matters. Delivering effective and predictable outcomes, improving efficiency, and elevating the patient experience through digital orthodontics takes more than innovation, it requires experienced doctors who can apply it effectively in everyday practice. By bringing together Align integrated digital solutions and real-world clinical insights, the Invisalign EMEA Ortho Summit brought the region together, and provided an opportunity to collaborate with experts, expand clinical confidence, and share our latest innovations. I was also thrilled that we could offer participants early access to 3D Soft Tissue Animation, becoming the first Invisalign customers in the EMEA region to gain access to this innovation."
Immersive Innovation Hub Showcases the Future of Orthodontics
At the center of the Summit was the Align Innovation Hub – an interactive end-to-end representation of a modern digital orthodontic practice. Designed as a "live" patient journey, the experience guided attendees from consultation through treatment to retention, demonstrating how digital tools can work seamlessly together.
The Hub featured:
- A simulated clinical environment showcasing doctor-led consultations for teens and adults alongside integrated workflows
- Collaborative spaces for peer learning and exchange
- A gallery of current and upcoming innovations
"The Innovation Hub showed how seamlessly everything can connect in a digital workflow," said Dr. Jesús Veres, an orthodontist from Valencia, Spain, who attended the Summit. "Getting hands-on with each step of the process, from digital scanning to treatment planning to how we engage patients, gave me ideas I can take back to my practice to improve the experience for my patients."
In addition to showcasing current Invisalign System innovations, the Summit's Innovation Hub offered previews of several solutions expected by mid-2026, each aimed at bringing greater digital precision and consistency to traditionally manual procedures.* Highlights included:
- The Invisalign Specifix™ Attachment System – a 3D printed attachment solution that combines attachments 3D-printed to the exact shape and size indicated in the doctor's treatment plan with a novel bonding accessory for precise placement1. The Specifix system is designed to reduce variability in attachment size and placement, increase consistency, and streamline the attachment workflow.
- Invisalign® integrated buttons – a new digital approach to the small, bonded accessories used to anchor elastics and apply targeted forces during treatment. Digitally integrated buttons incorporate button planning into the ClinCheck® treatment planning workflow, replacing the standard manual process. With this digital approach, button type and position are determined within the software during treatment planning, helping to reduce chairside guesswork, improve placement accuracy, and deliver a more flexible, precise, and efficient bite correction.
- Invisalign® Palatal Expander with integrated hook features– a further evolution of Align's 3D-printed palatal expander system designed to help doctors treat a broader range of patients with added flexibility. Building on the clinically effective2 Invisalign Palatal Expander (IPE) system, the new forward- and backward-facing integrated hooks are compatible with elastics3, offering intuitive enhancements to palatal expansion treatment.
- Invisalign clear aligner custom trimline option gives doctors greater control over aligner gingival margins to support improved aesthetics, comfort, and clinical flexibility. In cases where doctors feel there is insufficient retention, they can consider an extended scalloped trimline for short clinical crowns, erupting dentition cases, preferences for fewer attachments, extended tooth coverage in gingival recession and in extending to include the undercut of the clinical crowns. Integrated directly into the ClinCheck® digital treatment planning workflow, custom trim lines allow doctors to personalize aligner design based on individual patient anatomy and treatment.
- 3D Soft Tissue Animation, EMEA Ortho Summit participants also received early access to this recent innovation, becoming the first customers in the EMEA region.
"We're excited about the innovations previewed at the EMEA Summit and what they signal for the day-to-day reality of running a practice," said Prof. Dr. Anton Demling, Uelzen, Germany, who participated as a speaker during the Summit. "Invisalign integrated buttons and the Specifix attachment system will take things that have traditionally required a lot of manual steps and variability and make them far more straightforward and consistent. That means less guesswork for teams, more predictable outcomes, and a noticeably better experience for patients. It's a simpler way of working that just makes sense."
Peer-Led Education and Clinical Exchange
The Summit program featured dozens of orthodontist-led sessions covering complex case treatment for cases such as impacted canines, digital workflow optimization, and patient engagement strategies. Interactive formats including panel discussions, breakout lecture sessions, and live demonstrations encouraged open dialogue and knowledge sharing among clinicians.
"What made this event especially valuable was the openness among colleagues and the quality of peer-to-peer learning," said Dr. Nelly Dilkova, an orthodontist from Bulgaria, who also participated as a speaker. "The conversations went beyond innovation alone and focused on how we can use digital tools more effectively for our patients. Hearing colleagues share real clinical cases and practical workflows gave me valuable insights I can immediately apply in my practice. This outstanding atmosphere inspired new ways of thinking about the future of digital orthodontics."
Advancing Integrated Digital Orthodontics with the Invisalign System
The Invisalign EMEA Ortho Summit reflects Align's broader strategy to advance connected, digitally enabled orthodontic care. Ongoing investments in the Align™ Digital Platform continue to integrate scanning, visualization, treatment planning, appliance fabrication, treatment monitoring, and retention into a unified ecosystem designed to support doctors and enhance patient outcomes. Strategic areas of progress include:
- Advancing digital orthodontic workflows that connect intraoral scanning, digital treatment planning, aligner fabrication, monitoring, and retention into seamless, data-driven experiences for doctors and patients.
- Continued leadership in digital manufacturing and 3D printing, enabling consistent, high-quality Invisalign aligner production at global scale while supporting speed and reliability for orthodontic practices.
- Ongoing investment in automation, designed to help doctors work more efficiently while maintaining clinical oversight and control as case complexity and practice scale increase.
- Expansion of diagnostic and visualization capabilities, supporting earlier intervention, improved patient understanding, and more confident treatment planning across a broader range of malocclusions and growth patterns.
- Scaling of integrated solutions, reflecting growing adoption of digitally connected orthodontic workflows in diverse practice models.
- Independent validation of the Invisalign Palatal Expander (IPE) – A clinical study by researchers at the University of Insubria, Italy found that the Invisalign Palatal Expander was shown to effectively widen the upper jaw by opening the natural growth seam in the palate, achieving bone and bite changes similar to a traditional metal Hyrax expander. IPE also delivered more controlled and predictable results than Hyrax, supporting its use as a reliable option for growing patients and highlighting its role as a key step toward fully digital orthodontic care4.
Together, these and other planned innovations reinforce Align's long‑term strategy to move beyond individual products toward connected experiences and outcomes, supporting prevention, early intervention, and digitally driven care delivery across orthodontic practices worldwide.
About Align Technology, Inc. Align Technology designs and manufactures the Invisalign® System, the most advanced clear aligner system in the world, iTero™ intraoral scanners and services, and exocad™ CAD/CAM software. These technology building blocks enable enhanced digital orthodontic and restorative workflows to improve patient outcomes and practice efficiencies for approximately 299.5 thousand doctor customers and are key to accessing Align's 600 million consumer market opportunity worldwide. Over the past 29 years, Align has helped doctors treat approximately 22.8 million patients with the Invisalign System and is driving the evolution in digital dentistry through the Align™ Digital Platform, our integrated suite of unique, proprietary technologies and services delivered as a seamless, end-to-end solution for patients and consumers, orthodontists and GP dentists, and lab/partners. Visit www.aligntech.com for more information.
For additional information about the Invisalign System or to find an Invisalign doctor in your area, please visit www.invisalign.com. For additional information about the iTero digital scanning system, please visit www.itero.com. For additional information about exocad dental CAD/CAM offerings and a list of exocad reseller partners, please visit www.exocad.com.
Invisalign, iTero, exocad, Align, Align Digital Platform, and iTero Lumina are trademarks of Align Technology, Inc.
* The availability of products may vary by market and is subject to applicable regulatory approvals and clearances. Please check with your local Align team for further information.
- Based on bench testing conducted in August 2025 according to Design Verification on Specifix™ attachment volume precision (A035851). Data on File at Align Technology, as of January 28, 2026.
- Based on data from a multi-site US IDE (Investigational Device Exemption) clinical study (n=29 subjects, ages 7-10 years) of expansion treatment with Invisalign® Palatal Expanders. Data on file at Align Technology, as of October 30, 2023
- Elastics are not supplied/provided by Align Technology, Inc
- Levrini L, Saran S, Imbesi E, Vanini I, Russo V, Rimoldi V, Carganico A, Giannotta N and Perugini M (2026), Skeletal and dentoalveolar effects on the midpalatal suture and maxillary arch assessed by occlusal radiographs and three-dimensional digital models in patients treated with Invisalign palatal expander and rapid palatal expander: a pilot study. Front. Dent. Med. 7:1757094. doi: 10.3389/fdmed.2026.1757094
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260521046209/en/
Align Technology
Madelyn Valente
(909) 833-5839
mvalente@aligntech.com
Zeno Group
Sarah Karlson
(828) 551-4201
sarah.karlson@zenogroup.com