MUMBAI: The regions largest technology trade shows have ended on a vibrant and positive note, attracting 60,552 attendees as well as top honchos from the IT, communication and broadcasting industries. Of this, 48.4 percent were from overseas.
CommunicAsia, EnterpriseIT and BroadcastAsia 2005 exhibitions and conferences which ended today, drew praise and favourable comments from exhibitors, visitors, conference speakers and delegates alike.
Both the shows and conferences surpassed our expectations, says Stephen Tan, Chief Executive of organiser Singapore Exhibition Services Pte Ltd.
An estimated 1,600 delegates and speakers were at CommunicAsia and BroadcastAsia conferences. The exhibitions at the Singapore Expo, accommodated 2,238 exhibiting companies from 55 countries covering 62,000 sq metres of exhibition space.
For the first time the CommunicAsia Summit conference featured a three-day CEO Perspective panel session, where head honchos of telcos and vendors exchanged industry views and insights with the audience.
I find this conference very good for sharing and bouncing ideas, says Tom Goodwin, regional CTO of Lucent Technologies, and one of the panel speakers. Mr Goodwin shared with delegates his insight into the mobile phone market. Mobile operators most valuable asset is their subscriber base, he says. But currently theres nothing that the operators are providing that will enable them to hold on to their subscribers, he cautions.
-Another head honcho at the CEO dialogue session was Siemens Communications Thorsten Heins. It was my pleasure to speak, he says. This was such a high quality and vibrant audience. The questions they asked were also excellent. I spoke here in CommunicAsia in 1993. I would certainly love to speak again. As a board member of Siemens with responsibility for Asia Pacific, I will come here again, adds Mr Heins who is based in Munich, Germany.
On the exhibition itself, the convergence theme has brought more mobile operators and handset manufacturers than ever before which is perfect for Zi, says Canadian exhibitor Zi Corps chief operating officer Milos Djokovic. Our Qix service discovery platform is just what 3G needs to increase usage and drive up ARPU; CommunicAsia gave us a perfect Asian launch pad, he adds.
The three shows will be the centre of ICT trading for South-east Asia and the Middle East. Visitor traffic has been very good and we got a lot of potential customers. The visitors come from a wide range of countries both local and international. says Mr Panutat Tejasen, board member of Thailands Software Industry Promotion Agency (SIPA).
There are a lot more visitors this year compared with last year, says manager Ahn Sung-Joon of the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency pavilion at CommunicAsia. The Korean companies find CommunicAsia very vibrant. Korean companies are well-known for their IT products, so many companies proceed to the Korean pavilion for IT products. We expect to come back to CommunicAsia next year.
On the BroadcastAsia side, exhibitor Harris Corps trade show manager Marilyn O Dear says: This year has been even better than last year. The addition of the Encoda system to our booth has also been very successful.
Agreeing with her is international sales manager Victor Sunol of Just Edit, a Spanish broadcast solution provider. We have made good contacts, especially from Cambodia, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
Another broadcast exhibitor Millers managing director Grant Clementson says: Weve done the show every year since its launch. We are pleased with visitors to our booth from all across the region Indonesia, Vietnam, Cambodia and Malaysia.
We find CommunicAsia very useful, says Mora J. Siregar, research and analysis marketing executive with Indonesias Indosat, a repeat visitor who was here last year. General manager Nuttakij Chareon of Kuan Dee Churng Dee Co. of Thailand, another repeat visitor, agrees that CommunicAsia is the place to source d educational opportunities.
