New event venue opens in Antalya
A new congress and exhibition centre has opened in Antalya, Turkey – the NEST International Convention Centre.
Situated along the Mediterranean coastline, the new-build offers 14,864m2 of indoor meeting space with another 5,017m2 outdoors. Both floors include foyers and main halls, as well as workshops accessible for trucks and heavy machinery. In addition, a 3GB fibre-optic connection runs throughout the building, as well as a kitchen which can serve 5,000 for a sit-down gala dinner.
NEST will also sport 2,973m2 of solar panels on the roof, as a step towards more sustainable meetings.
PPHG goes to Toronto
Pan Pacific Hotels Group (PPHG) has added a Toronto hotel to its list of properties, with the rebranding of The Westin Prince Hotel.
Located in North East Toronto, the hotel offers 409 guestrooms and suites, with many overlooking the six hectares of greenery surrounding the hotel and the cityscape.
Amenities on-site include Katsura Japanese restaurant; Seasons, the all-day diner; an outdoor heated pool; a tennis court; and a fitness centre with a whirlpool.
Pan Pacific Toronto also features more than 2,780m2 of meeting spaces including 18 meeting rooms and a ballroom which can hold up to 700 guests. Events are possible on the greens outdoors.
Pan Pacific Toronto is the fifth hotel for PPHG in North America, joining other hotels in Vancouver, Whistler in British Columbia and Seattle.
AIDS conference to meet in London in 2021
ExCeL London and the London Convention Bureau have announced that London has been selected as the host city for the 2021 European AIDS Conference (EACS).
Organised by the European AIDS Clinical Society, the 18th edition of the event will be held at ExCeL London, October 27-30 .
EACS is the latest medical association to have chosen London and ExCeL for events between 2021 and 2025. Others include the European Society of Cardiology, International Society of Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, and the International Society on Thrombosis and Haemostasis.
Sanjay Bhagani, president-elect of the European AIDS Clinical Society and consultant physician at Royal Free Hospital in London, said: “We are delighted to be hosting the 18th European HIV Conference in London in 2021. The UK has made great progress in achieving and surpassing the UNAIDS targets for the Fast-track strategy for eliminating AIDS as a major Global Health threat by 2030. This will be a unique opportunity to share our experience and advances in science with partners and colleagues across Europe and globally and learn from each other. London will provide a truly multi-cultural experience for all our delegates.”
David Wong is the co-founder and CEO of BOOQED, a digital platform for tenants and landlords to find or monetise short-term unused business spaces. He brings extensive international corporate and start-up experience, including two successful exits from previous ventures.
Two of South-east Asia’s strongest markets for corporate meetings and incentives are said to have potential for further growth, provided the region’s events service providers are able to identify trends and capitalise on them, according to two market opinion leaders who spoke at the fourth BE@Penang conference organised by the Penang Convention & Exhibition Bureau (PCEB).
Speaking during the session titled, Market Digest: Insight & Trends, last Thursday, Prashant Yadav, CEO of Liberty International India, shared that South-east Asia was a natural favourite among Indian event organisers because it is a medium-haul destination. However, to keep them coming, regional CVBs and inbound events agents must be more creative in marketing their destinations.
One of the misconceptions about Indian MICE groups that must go was the belief that Indians want only Indian cuisine while on their travels.
Prashant said: “There is a growing number of Indians who are willing to try local food when overseas.”
Further illustrating his point, he said 15 per cent of his corporate clients today avoided “Indian food of any kind” when overseas, and he predicted this number to grow to become 40 to 50 per cent within the next decade.
Prashant added that while Indian clients have done their events at major South-east Asian cities, most were willing to return to the destination if inbound specialists could offer memorable experiences that cannot be found themselves.
He also tipped the audience off to a growing desire among Indian corporates for “interactive and participatory” corporate social responsibility (CSR) programmes.
As for the UK market, Ross Barker, commercial director of the meetings portfolio for Northstar Travel Media UK, shared that event organisers in Asia to seriously look at digital protection and hire the services of pedigree technology providers with a reliable track record to support events. He explained that corporate groups from the UK pay particular attention to digital breaches and delegate data protection.
In addition, he emphasised a growing trend in the UK for personalisation of events for a multi-generational audience. Such events has to allow human connections and cultural enrichment for attendees in destinations they visit.
Sustainable meeting venues are also no longer trendy, but a necessity for UK event owners.
Against a backdrop of Brexit uncertainty, Barker said longhaul travel for UK meeting and incentive groups have remained buoyant. Referencing the Meetings & Incentive Travel 2016 & 2018 Trends & Spends report, he pointed out that the number of business events groups and participants to longhaul destinations from the UK had increased in 2018 against 2016. The report found 574 business events groups in 2018 with a total of 57,849 participants, compared with 247 groups with 22,239 participants in 2016.
Average group size in 2018 was 101 delegates compared with 90 in 2016 while the length of stay over both periods remained at three nights.
The Meetings Show 2019 survey further revealed that over 36 per cent of UK buyers identified South-east Asia, namely Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand as future destinations for their meetings, events and incentives. Meanwhile, 55 per cent of those surveyed said they were planning events in longhaul destinations over the next 12 months.