In just eight weeks, four of the ten largest exhibition groups in the world have been sold. This is unprecedented in the history of the exhibition industry – as are the sums of money involved. There is one common theme and that is the effect of AI. From Exhibition News, by Phil Soar…
The German Trade Show industry contributes around €30bn annually to Germany’s economic output and safeguards at least 280,000 jobs, according to a recent report from the economic research institute Prognos, commissioned by the Association of the German Trade Fair Industry (AUMA). The study is based on surveys of over 33,700 visitors and 17,700 exhibiting companies…
From Exhibition News – CloserStill Media and Nineteen Group chairman Phil Soar ponders the significance for recent mainstream media interest in exhibitions and events: Something very strange has occurred. In the past month we have seen two positive articles in the Financial Times praising trade show companies and talking about billion-pound deals, DMG declaring that…
From Exhibition News, Steve Monnington of Mayfield Merger Strategies reviews the M&A transactions of the past 12 months: In a recent article, Colin Morrison asks whether 2025 will be the year that media M&A rebounds. He references US investment bankers who are predicting a big year in M&A since stock markets are near all-time highs…
From Exhibition News: For the hottest buzzword in the industry, very little is understood about data. At the recent IBTM World show in Barcelona, there was scarcely a session that didn’t mention its importance. Vice-president of European sales at Cvent Jamie Vaughan went so far as to say: “An event planner without data is just…
From Exhibition News: Nineteen Group has been sold to an additional private equity fund for around £225m. The sale establishes a new Growth Partnership Fund, led by Kline Hill Partners and co-led by Ares Management, and includes the continued involvement of Nineteen’s original investor, Phoenix Equity Partners. The ‘continuation’ fund is worth £200m and will…
From Exhibition News: Informa has had a £1.2bn offer to buy the owner of the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity and Money20/20 accepted by Ascential’s shareholders. The offer of 568 pence in cash per share represents a 53% premium to Ascential’s closing share price of 371 pence on Monday, the day before the ‘unsolicited’…
From Exhibition News: With the results now in, the Labour Party has emerged victorious as the new governing party of the United Kingdom, with Kier Starmer leading his party to a resounding landslide victory. This political shift will – hopefully – usher in a new era of optimism and ambition, not just for the nation…
From Exhibition News, by Phil Soar: The control Microsoft has on its marketplace has been much in the news. It effectively forced the board of OpenAI to take back Sam Altman as CEO after a mysterious firing – a power reinforced by its $13bn investment in the artificial intelligence firm. Then, Microsoft finally acquired Activision…
From Exhibition News: The UK exhibitions industry generates £9.4bn in trade, attracts 6.1 million global visitors and provides 99,000 jobs, according to the latest Economic Impact Study from the Events Industry Alliance (EIA). This report, the fourth of its kind, was first compiled in 2005 by KPMG and updated by Oxford Economics using the same…
From Exhibition News: The Events Industry Alliance (EIA) launched a manifesto and three key ‘policy asks’ for the Government during a reception held at the Houses of Parliament yesterday. The manifesto details the EIA’s mission to ensure that the interests of business events in the UK are effectively represented, understood and communicated to MPs across…
By Phil Soar, Chairman, CloserStill Group and Nineteen Group, from Exhibition News: On 11 August, 2020, I wrote a piece in EN about “Hopin” and have followed this up with occasional health reports since. Hopin was, according to The Times, the future of events, a future which would be almost all online and digital…
EN guest editor, CloserStill and Nineteen Group chairman, Phil Soar shares the lessons he wishes he had known 30 years ago: No, this isn’t about wishing I knew how to talk to girls (though it might have helped), nor that buying Apple and Microsoft shares would make me rich, nor betting at 10,000 to one…
Exhibition News guest editor Phil Soar analyses the effects of Informa buying Tarsus on the wider industry and considers the road ahead for our major exhibition groups: “A couple of months ago that I suggested the trade show world was very likely to be back to normal by 2024 and, in many cases, well ahead…”
Steve Monnington of Mayfield Merger Strategies reports the most recent transactions and analyses the M&A news. As well as several deals announced, there have been two important pieces of news which could impact big ticket M&A. There were also seven transactions announced which brings the total for 2023 to 13… From Exhibition News…
In the normal pre-pandemic years of 2018 and 2019 there were over 80 reported exhibition transactions with over 50 buyers. As reported at the end of 2020 and 2021, Covid resulted in about 50% of normal M&A activity. 2022 represented the first post-Covid year but activity was still well below historic levels. From Exhibition News…
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