CEO of GainingEdge, Jon Sivertson, will be concluding his service at the global meetings industry consulting company at the end of February 2024.
The company’s senior partner, Mike Williams, is currently serving as acting CEO until a new permanent one can be appointed.
An active search for a new CEO is underway and anyone seeking to express interest in the position should contact GainingEdge Partner Bruce Redor.
As the new managing director of FCM Travel in India, what are the things on your to-do list?
There are a few key areas. Firstly, the widespread adoption of technology is paramount. In both personal and business travel, individuals have embraced technology wholeheartedly. We have a range of tech platforms powered by artificial intelligence AI that we aim to introduce to customers to enhance adoption.
Secondly, FCM has established an outstanding record in customer service with consistently high user experiences over the years. Our focus will remain in this area, and further elevate the user experience by leveraging the latest technology solutions.
We are also keen on developing a suite of non-air products, including hotels, railway car solutions, visa management, and sustainability. The goal is to position ourselves as a one-stop shop, offering a comprehensive suite of products to provide added value to our customers. We aspire to be travel partners, assisting our customers in growing their businesses.
Another of my priorities is our employees. As a certified ‘Great Place to Work,’ I will continue investing in our people because, ultimately, it is their commitment that will set us apart from others.
Could you paint a picture of India’s business travel performance last year?
Indian business travel rebounded last year, reaching pre-pandemic levels as demand surged. The primary driving force behind this growth was the eagerness of companies to meet customer needs, fulfil supply requirements, and expedite projects, leading to a substantial increase in travel activity.
Additionally, there was a notable uptick in demand for events and incentive business, with the exhibition sector making a robust comeback. Key contributors to the heightened demand for business travel in India included FMCG, insurance, pharmaceuticals, and banking companies.
Despite domestic air capacity exceeding pre-pandemic levels in terms of seat availability, international travel capacity remains a concern. Encouragingly, the gap between demand and supply is narrowing, and there are positive indications that international air capacity from India will return to pre-pandemic levels this year.
Obtaining visas continues to be a challenge, particularly for longhaul destinations such as the US and the Schengen region, with significant waiting periods. However, shorthaul destinations like Southeast Asia and the Middle East, along with domestic markets, benefitted as corporate entities explored alternative options.
Which outbound destinations are gaining popularity for incentive travel from India?
Vietnam is experiencing a significant surge in demand, with cities like Ho Chi Minh, Danang, and Hanoi becoming increasingly popular among Indian corporate travellers. Another destination generating substantial interest is Siem Reap in Cambodia. When it comes to longhaul markets, Japan and Turkey are steadily climbing the charts in terms of incentive travel popularity.
Do you see the emergence of India as an inbound MICE destination in the future?
There is significant activity unfolding in India with the emergence of new and noteworthy MICE venues such as the International Exhibition-cum-Convention Centre in New Delhi and The Jio World Convention Centre in Mumbai. These venues are established in cities encompassing top-notch hotels, dining options, and various tourist attractions.
I think that Mumbai and Delhi, being historically attractive to conferences and business travellers, position these convention centres favourably to draw substantial MICE attendance in 2024 and beyond.
Recently, India has also been making positive headlines, with its growing economy and business destination credentials. Across industries, from IT to pharmaceuticals, the growth is truly exhilarating. This growth signifies that industry-specific conferences, which were previously rare in India or often shifted to other parts of Asia, are now inclined to take place in the country.
Meanwhile, India’s rich culture and history have consistently drawn inbound travellers, and in the next two years, I think that India will not only be on par with its competitors in terms of infrastructure, but will also be a compelling incentive destination.
How do you perceive the evolution of domestic MICE demand in India compared to outbound MICE in 2024? Which specific MICE verticals do you anticipate gaining more traction in the coming year?
I anticipate a robust demand for both domestic and international destinations. Previously, most of the MICE movement used to be outbound, but these days, there is a lot more demand for inbound.
The MICE infrastructure in India has seen remarkable improvement, thanks to the establishment of new standalone venues and hotels equipped with state-of-the-art conferencing facilities.
The Indian aviation sector is also experiencing a boom, evident in the record aircraft orders from airlines. These factors collectively contribute to the escalating demand for domestic business events.
This demand isn’t limited to specific verticals. With the return to normalcy, whether it’s incentives, meetings, or participation in exhibitions, the demand is expected to be widespread.
Managed by XIN MICE (Beijing) and TTG Asia Media, CTW China 2024 will be held on March 26-28, 2024, at the Shanghai Convention & Exhibition Centre of International Sourcing (SHCEC), Shanghai, China.
It will be co-located with IT&CM China as China’s Only Doublebill Event in MICE and Corporate Travel.
The keynote speaker on March 26 will be Sun Weijia, special researcher of Counsellors’ Office of the State Council, and he will address the importance of how governments can influence the growth of meeting destinations.
Four guest speakers that will head onto the stage for the panel session following the keynote include Zhu Jun, senior manager of convention, exhibition and corporate events, Hong Kong Tourism Board Beijing Office; Lisa Xu, president of SITE China Chapter, and general manager of Shanghai Estar Event Management; Joost de Meyer, CEO of US-based First Incentive Travel; and Yu Dandan, deputy general manager of Beijing Zhongrunhua Petrochemical.
On March 27 will be the Association Day Forum, where the keynote speaker will be Jayne Gallagher, president of the International Association of Aquatic Product Inspectors, and founder and CEO of Honey & Fox. She will touch on how Chinese trade associations and Chambers of Commerce play an important role in facilitating the global push of their corporate members
She will be joined on stage by Zhang Lin, deputy secretary-general of China Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Association; Mariarosa Azzolina, president of Istituto Italo Cinese; and Deng Qing, director of the International Exchange Committee of Canal Cities of the World Canal History and Culture Cooperation Organization.
Both sessions will be moderated by Alicia Yao, vice chairman of the China Congress of Association and Chamber of Commerce.
In total, IT&CM China and CTW China 2024 expects to welcome more than 500 buyers, with at least 150 of them being international buyers. Of these, more than 35 per cent are expected to be from Europe and the Americas, with the rest coming from Asia-Pacific.
The 2024 Taipei Game Show (TGS), held from January 25-28, returned after a four-year hiatus to the Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center.
Official tallies over the four-day event counted around 36,000 attendees, and the event was supported by both domestic and international exhibitors.
This year, the TGS B2B Zone this year drew in more than 1,800 business visitors from 35 countries and regions over two days, leading to almost 2,000 business discussions, affirming Taiwan’s role as a crucial hub in the Asia-Pacific gaming market.
The B2B Zone biz-matching system continued to offer the business card exchange feature for a month, allowing all business visitors to extend their networking beyond the physical venue. TGS will also periodically host various themed business networking events and continue collaborations with global expos.
The Asia Pacific Game Summit, which addressed the latest industry trends, was also filled. Bandai Namco Entertainment, Square Enix, Shueisha Games, and Ubisoft Montpellier, shared their diverse experiences of developing major game titles. Industry experts from companies such as Moloco, Xsolla, Google, Worldpay, Cloudflare, and The Game Marketer participated, dissecting from multiple angles how game operators can address pain points in marketing, payments, cybersecurity, localisation, and cloud applications, sharing secrets to exploring new blue ocean markets.
The next TGS will take place from January 23-26, 2025.
Event brief
Organised by Destination Mekong, the fourth edition of the Destination Mekong Summit was hosted at OCIC Sales Centre in Phnom Penh from December 6-7, 2023.
The two-day hybrid event gathering was held under the theme Mekong in Motion, Mekong Emotion(s), and saw almost 40 speakers deliver engaging sessions to more than 250 tourism players from across the Mekong region.
Hosted annually, the Summit aims to provide a platform for industry stakeholders, policymakers and investors to come together to exchange ideas and insights, while contributing to sustainably growing tourism in the region.
Event highlights
The dynamic agenda took in a series of panel discussions and interactive workshops covering a range of topics relevant to the region’s tourism landscape, as well as an evening networking reception, industry matchmaking breakfast and a post-summit fam trip.
Plenary panel sessions included destinations to watch in 2024, empowering tourism players with essential skills and standards, and how innovation and collaboration is key to achieving a zero-waste tourism future.
In addition, the future of agri-tourism, developing adventure and community-based eco-tourism, and championing the region as a creative and transformative tourism hub were topics on the agenda.
A series of hands-on workshops were also held exploring a range of topics, from protecting children and vulnerable communities, and digital transformation in tourism and hospitality, to simplifying sustainability and promoting Cambodia as a wellness destination.
Making its event debut was ‘Mekong Stories’, which saw a host of industry players take to the stage to share their inspirational tourism tales. These included François Schnoebelen, director of EHT Paul Dubrule; and Sokleap Ngon, CEO and cofounder of Smiling Gecko Cambodia.
The host venue was also filled with stalls selling local wares and food, providing a promotional platform for local businesses and startups.
The Summit ended with an optional fam trip to the coastal city of Sihanoukville, with visits to the recently-launched, community-based TONTONTON Plastic Impact Tour and an overnight stay at Song Saa Island.
Challenges
Catherine Germier-Hamel, Destination Mekong CEO, said time – there were less than two months to organise the event – as well as resources and budget constraints were the main challenges.
“This forces us to be more creative because a lot of times when you have a full budget, you miss the boat. I think when you’re up against it, there’s this kind of tension that makes the event exciting and engaging.”
The tight budget and limited cash sponsors were compensated by finding Summit partners, who were able to donate venues, sponsor speakers and pay some transport costs. Germier-Hamel added that with the inability to pay speakers, she had to offer them an incentive, such as promoting their business on stage, while ensuring they add value to the audience.
“They can promote their business and project, but they always need to think about what they can offer to the audience; what value can they bring and which projects they can inspire, rather than just presenting and delivering,” she elaborated.
Another challenge was ensuring the Summit catered to the differing interests of attendees. “There are different needs and expectations, so what can be challenging is to really balance the interests of everybody because we want to create opportunities for participants but also for the speakers.”
Event Destination Mekong Summit
Organiser Destination Mekong
Venue OCIC Sales Centre, Phnom Penh
Date December 6-7, 2023
Attendance Around 250 delegates
Come September 2026, Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland will play host to the International Confederation of Principals (ICP) World Convention.
The convention will be hosted at the New Zealand International Convention Centre (NZICC) and is expected to attract up to 3,000 school principals from around the world. New Zealand last hosted the event in 2007.
Securing this significant event was a team effort between the New Zealand Principals’ Federation (NZPF), the Auckland Convention Bureau (ACB), a division of Tātaki Auckland Unlimited, and Tourism New Zealand’s Conference Assistance Programme. Letters of support and endorsement for Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland as host city were also received from principals around the country, the Mayor of Auckland, and the central government.
The convention is expected to deliver an estimated NZ$4.6 million (US$2.8 million) boost to Auckland’s economy and offers international guests the chance to explore the region and the rest of the country.
NZPF’s president, Leanne Otene, is expecting a good turnout. She stated: “New Zealand offers a unique perspective. We’re at that leading edge in terms of being culturally responsive to First Nations people, and educators around the world want to see how that’s done.”
As such, delegates will also have the opportunity to visit schools around the city to see how the country embraces different cultures, and building a generation that is more tolerant of difference.
This comes as principals around the world are facing similar issues on a few fronts, including a decline in learners/pupils attending school and the emergence of artificial intelligence, added Otene.
Head of ACB, Ken Pereira, noted: “Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland is home to more than 220 ethnic groups and the largest Māori and Pacific populations of any city outside of the Pacific Islands. For a conference like the International Confederation of Principals, this point of difference is a crucial draw card.
“Auckland’s DNA is defined by the fact that more than a third of Aucklanders were born overseas. It’s what makes Auckland such a must-visit destination and award-winning host region for events – the knowledge and the culture we share with delegates are invaluable.”
The IMEX Frankfurt team has published a Sustainable Event Report revealing the successes, experiments and learnings from last year’s show.
The report lifts the lid on sustainability planning in the run-up to and execution of IMEX Frankfurt 2023, sharing achievements in waste diversion and energy use, as well as highlighting opportunities for improvement.
As part of the brand refresh launched at the show, the team invested in date-free signage that can be used year after year. They also reduced printed signage where possible and used digital projection in some areas. The result was 85 per cent less print production overall compared to 2022.
Significant strides were made in the areas of F&B, with a particular focus on reducing carbon-heavy dishes such as beef (beef generates 60 kilograms of greenhouse gas emissions per kilogram of meat produced). At the show’s food court, beef options were reduced to less than five per cent of the menus and over half (58 per cent) of food sales were vegetarian or vegan.
Exhibitors also played their part: Frankfurt Convention Bureau, for example, delivered all booth materials and supplies by bike to reduce fossil fuel consumption. Across the showfloor, there was a substantial drop in single-use, “build & burn” booths – a reduction of 38 per cent compared to 2019 levels. The IMEX team is now working to improve this as part of the Better Stands initiative which sets classification criteria according to how much of a stand/booth is reused or recycled.
Four electric buses were also utilised to transport attendees from Frankfurt’s main railway station to Messe Frankfurt, saving an estimated 103 kg CO2e.
Carina Bauer, CEO of the IMEX Group, said: “This is the second report we’ve produced, working with our sustainability consultants MeetGreen, meaning we can now benchmark our progress against 2022. It’s an opportunity to share our successes and our challenges with the wider industry so that they can take what we’ve learned and weave these into their events.”
The IMEX Group has also launched its net zero roadmap, part of its commitment to the industry-wide Net Zero Carbon Events (NZCE) initiative. The company intends to reach net zero by 2030, ahead of the 2050 target set out by NZCE in line with the Paris Agreement.
All participants at this year’s IMEX Frankfurt can play their part by signing up to the People and Planet Pledge. Exhibitors can also use the IMEX Sustainable Exhibiting Guide.
IMEX Frankfurt 2024 will take place at Messe Frankfurt May 14-16, 2024.
The IMEX Frankfurt 2023 sustainability report can be downloaded here.
Silversea has expanded the role of cruise industry veteran Massimo Brancaleoni who becomes senior vice president, global sales & revenue.
With almost 30 years of experience in the global cruise industry, Brancaleoni has held executive positions for international organisations in Europe and Asia. He joined Silversea in January 2023 as senior vice president, global sales.
Prior to joining Silversea, he held the role of senior vice president, worldwide sales, at Costa Cruises.
Launched in 2022, Singapore’s MICE Sustainability Roadmap is now a year old. What progress has been made?
Since the launch of the roadmap in 2022, STB has worked with Singapore Association of Convention & Exhibition Organisers & Suppliers (SACEOS), Singapore Standards Council (SSC), which is overseen by Enterprise Singapore, and public and private stakeholders to launch the Workshop Agreement (WA) 3 Sustainable MICE – Guidelines for waste management (March 2023), and the Workshop Agreement (WA) 4 Sustainable MICE – Guidelines for carbon emissions management (July 2023).
Currently, the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC) is working on the development of the GSTC MICE Criteria, with support from STB. Development officially started in April 2023, and this will serve to meet the need for an international standard in sustainability for the business events industry.
SACEOS is also refreshing the MICE Sustainability Certification (MSC) to ensure the industry has a current, robust set of standards to adhere to, and get certified against. This is on track to be launched in early 2024.
In July 2023, the inaugural Sustainability Innovation Marketplace was launched at the Singapore MICE Forum. The Marketplace explored various solutions, which included a zero-waste prototype booth by Miniwiz, an idea born by STB, Informa Markets, and members of the Global MICE Sustainability Alliance. The booth, which can be dismantled, packed, and reused, will be showcased in the coming years.
These efforts add to our attractiveness as a sustainable and responsible travel destination, and contribute to our target of developing sustainability standards, as well as reducing waste and achieving net-zero emissions.
What support is STB providing?
STB developed the Tourism Sustainability Programme (TSP) to support tourism businesses at all stages of their sustainability journey. Grant schemes are open to more than 1,800 eligible companies in the tourism sector.
Grants such as the Business Improvement Fund (BIF) and Training Industry Professionals in Tourism (TIP-iT) also support sustainability initiatives that improve productivity and competitiveness. Companies can tap on the TIP-iT grant to train staff to take on new sustainability roles and grow their talent pipeline.
We also support event organisers in their event planning process and publicise their events as part of positioning Singapore as a leading sustainable business events destination. Visitors can visit the Visit Singapore website to find out more about sustainable accommodation, sustainable itineraries, green brands, and green venues.
What does STB need from business events stakeholders to ensure that the 2050 net-zero goal can be met?
According to ICCA, 44 per cent of international associations have changed their RFPs in the last three years, with sustainability requirements being the second most common change.
Hence, companies need to continue thinking about how sustainability makes business sense for them and how it fits into their processes. For example, investments in sustainability solutions, such as food waste management and sustainable building management systems can benefit bottom lines in the long run.
Associations and event organisers can work with STB to shape the legacy they want to achieve and leave a lasting impact on the wider community. This appeals to those who are keen to create a positive impact, be it through incorporating eco-friendly experiences into their delegate journey, or co-investing in resources to guide our local industry in adopting more sustainable practices.
What is next on Singapore’s sustainability agenda?
Singapore will continue to attract and nurture sustainability-themed events that enable the sharing of best practices. This includes the Asia Climate Forum, Ecosperity Week, Singapore Carbon Market & Investor Forum, and World Cities Summit.
Upcoming sustainability-themed events in Singapore include Investments into Forestry & Biodiversity Summit (January 16-17, 2024), Plastics Recycling Asia (November 13-14, 2024), and Global Sustainable Tourism Council Global Conference 2024 (November 13-16, 2024).
TTGmice’s e-news will be taking a break from Friday, February 9, 2024, for the Lunar New Year holidays. News will resume on Wednesday, February 14, 2024.
From all of us at TTG Asia Media, we wish all of our readers a happy and prosperous Year of the Dragon!
