Meetings and Events Industry News

Las Vegas is becoming a world leader in autonomous systems, drone tech, esports, and other emerging industries. Those clusters of local expertise offer a growing value proposition for conference organizers who want to tap into the future of innovation.

Designing a conference like a festival leads to some edges and messy experiences that challenge and confuse attendees. It will be fascinating to see how the concept fares as it is exported to a diverse range of global destinations.

C2 may be past the point of reinventing itself as it looks to export its brand of experiential business conferences around the world. Yet, the tweaks it has made to its hallmark event demonstrate the work to scale its interactive festival as its popularity surges.

Event planners know technology can enhance the attendee experience if deployed appropriately. How much technology is too much, though, remains an open question.

The growth of mobile meeting apps presents planners with a dilemma filled with irony. Are the apps — aimed at facilitating and enhancing the meeting experience — actually diminishing the kind of face-to-face interactions that are the very purpose of on-site events?

Mobile platforms are making it easier to develop augmented reality experiences. The opportunity is emerging for conferences and events to make a big impact on the event experience through new and intuitive digital tools.

For augmented reality to catch on, apps need to use the technology for useful tools instead of gimmicks. We're starting to see the beginning of this shift and events should pay attention to ways augmented reality can enrich experiences instead of replacing them.

It's an open secret that meetings and events are often rife with sexual harassment and other types of unsavory behavior. The industry wants to do more to create safer environments, but is only in the early stages of what will have to be a widespread cultural change.

Meetings represent a perfect storm for the kinds of incidents that sparked the #MeToo movement: Attendees gather in hotels and resorts and socialize at networking sessions fueled by alcohol. The industry is just now reacting with codes of conduct but that may not be nearly enough.

With Asia becoming a more popular meetings destination for Western organizations, events professionals need to understand local capabilities and cultural nuances. Often, local assistance on the ground can be the difference between success and failure.