Doug Emslie, Tarsus group MD
"Turkey has seen a recent acceleration of growth in its exhibition market driven by its strong market dynamics, strategic geographic position and the push by international organisers to enter and develop in the market.
The market has moved from being primarily domestic to one that is quickly developing strong regional exhibition brands. The infrastructure currently in place in Istanbul is of a very good standard. Istanbul has three international exhibition centres – Tuyap, CNR and the World Trade Centre. Each venue offers different advantages depending on the needs of the show – large halls, smaller halls, proximity to the airport and public transport.
The venues today are adequate to deal with the historic growth in the domestic market. However are they big enough and good enough to deal with the growth and appetite of the international market?
Tuyap plans to add another two halls in 2014, CNR is expanding and there is a much talked about new 100,000sqm venue planned for Istanbul in 2016. The infrastructure to deliver exhibitions is not all about the venue but also about the roads, public transport and the airports. The road system in Istanbul is problematic but is improving slowly.
In conclusion, Turkey is a key growth market. This is in sharp contrast to the mature markets of the West, which may have the infrastructure but are slow and have no growth."
Muharrem Tunca, ITE regional events director
"The exhibition sector in Turkey, with new fair grounds operating in the country, has made a great breakthrough since the late 1990s. During this period, foreign investments, trade fairs throughout the country and international visitors have all shown an increase.
Today we can talk about numbers such as 100,000sqm when it comes to exhibition areas, while in the past this number was around 10,000sqm. This change has come about due to infrastructure investments. Germany, the UK and the Netherlands were the first international investors in Turkey in this sector.
Even though competition between companies and global economic crises have caused delays
in some of the investments, along with growing exhibition areas and the renovations
needed, the influence of the big companies has emerged. Turkey today functions as a home in the Eurasian region. As one of the world’s most influential cultural capitals, Istanbul has become the centre of trade shows, fairs and conventions. The city has also raised its profile with special events.
Turkey is expected to be the centre of the exhibition world in the region with the building of larger and more advanced exhibition areas."
Steve Monnington, Mayfield media Strategies MD
"Over the last few years we have seen many international companies enter the Turkish market, but we have yet to see the real growth in the exhibition sector that will come from this. The vast majority of activity so far has been the creation of partnerships with local organisers and the main emphasis has been on accelerating the growth of existing exhibitions, partly through increased international participation.
The next stage, launching new shows including the replication of the international partners’ own brands, is only just starting and it is this next phase that will test Turkey’s exhibition structure. International organisers were attracted by a combination of economic growth and the availability of local companies with market leading shows to act as their partner.
This potential is being tested and inhibited by the role of the two main Istanbul venues CNR and Tuyap, both major organisers in their own right, as well as by the relatively unsophisticated level of services such as stand construction that are often tied into the venue as well.
The other main inhibitor is the lack of combined exhibition and purpose-built conference facilities that allow larger scale shows to develop their content. Telecoms and Internet infrastructure that will allow sophisticated visitor tracking and the delivery of real time information onsite is not even on today’s agenda.
However, it is the very presence of companies such as UBM, Tarsus and Reed, and the continuing growth of the established businesses of Hannover Messe and ITE with their understanding of the need for increasing sophistication, that should act as the driving force for change. The catalyst for this can only be a new venue with independent hall management and, after many false starts, this finally seems to be happening. If the development of the new exhibition complex at Halkali comes to fruition it will be a game-changer and will immediately remove most of the current barriers to growth.
In the meantime, shows will continue to grow steadily with increased international participation. There will be some launches but the real jump in scale and quality will have to wait."
This was first published in Issue 1 2013 of EW. Any comments? Email exhibitionworld@mashmedia.net
