Memphis ARC dates plus new Africa/ME event

By Doug Newhouse |

Memphis Media Limited, the organisers of the Airline Retail Conference Asia-Pacific and Europe 2015 events is to hold its inaugural ARC Africa & Middle East conference in Cape Town, South Africa on 9-10 December 2015 at a venue to be announced.

 

 

This event will focus on ‘Understanding & Unlocking the Growth Potential in Africa’ and will explore how the inflight retail & airline ancillary revenue industry is developing and what innovations the industry might expect in the near future.

 

 

By contrast, the 6th ARC Asia-Pacific conference is scheduled for the Marina Bay Sands Hotel in Singapore on February 25-26, 2016. The organisers are promising another ‘exciting line-up’ of speakers, a growing exhibition and ‘great’ networking opportunities.

 

 

The company said: “The conference sessions will be co-located with a dedicated exhibition, ARC Expo, giving airline buyers from across the region the opportunity to meet with new and existing suppliers and to discover the latest innovations and product developments for inflight retail and ancillary revenue.

 

 

Karim Halwagi opened the event with a welcome to all delegates and it should be said that his team worked very hard throughout the duration. (Halwagi recently bought ARC from publisher, Ink).

 

“In addition to the main conference, there will be a number of key networking events, including lunches, drinks receptions and the AR Awards Dinner.”

 

 

The organisers have also decided to take ARC Europe 2016 back to the Olympia Conference Centre in London from 7-8 June 2016. They say this will build on the success of this year’s ‘fantastic conference programme’, which covered an array of subjects related to inflight retail, ancillary revenue and hugely popular Digital Traveller.”

 

 

Karim Halwagi, Managing Director of Memphis Media said: “We are very excited to announce our calendar of upcoming ARC Events and especially proud of the new events we are adding to the already successful portfolio.

 

 

“Feedback from ARC Asia-Pacific and ARC Europe delegates this year has been very positive and our aim is to build on this success and continue to deliver events which are thought provoking, valuable and which play an important part in driving growth and development in the inflight industry” said Karim Halwagi, Managing Director of Memphis Media.

 

As reported already, ETRC Secretary General Keith Spinks delivered an excellent opening keynote address at the ARC event in London, as he talked about the threats to the DF&TR industry and how they could potentially impact on the airline sector.

 

Comment: It has to be said that feedback from attendees to TRBusiness’ survey after the recent Olympia Europe event was a little more mixed than that described by the organisers.

 

 

There certainly were some very positive comments about the event, but there were also several made about a lack of buyers on the trade floor and some very empty conference rooms – despite a range of very good speakers (TRBusiness’ Editorial Director Doug Newhouse witnessed several after moderating several sessions over the two days).

 

 

TRBusiness believes the organisers should consider reducing the three-stream simultaneous conference system used this year to two – or even one – and we also question whether the organisers really need to hold the event at the Olympia Conference Centre. [When asked for our opinion after the recent Olympia event we expressed these views directly to Karim Halwagi-Ed].

 

 

More information on the recent Olympia event – including top-line findings from our aforementioned survey of exhibitors – can be found in the July issue of TRBusiness magazine.

 

A news report on the recent ARC conference, exhibition and award winners can also be found by clicking here: http://www.trbusiness.com/regional-news/international/several-hundred-attend-london-arc-event-2/76728

 

 

For more information on how to register for any of the upcoming ARC events, click here: http://www.arcevents.co or email: [email protected]

 

 

 

 

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