Increasing environmental pollution and problems concerning waste disposal demand the development of ecological manufacturing technologies. Today's research activities are concentrated on improving the properties of cutting tools for dry machining by optimizing manufacturing technologies and tool geometries, by alloying of special cutting materials and by coating of tools. In dry drilling of tempered steel, the wear mechanisms of different PVD-coated WC-cemented carbide tools were investigated. Considered topics are the influence of the used sputter technology (magnetron sputter ionplating-high ion sputtering) and of the Al/Ti-ratio on structure, adhesion strength and microhardness of (Ti,Al)N coatings and the effects on wear behaviour. Due to increased interface strength of microblasted tools with (Ti,Al)N-layers of high aluminium content, a superior wear behaviour in dry machining was found.