IT business exhibitions: Spoilt for choice?

Computer Faire `99 (CF) has made the decision even more difficult by announcing a change to its traditional format, turning its focus to IT in the business environment. This neatly clashes with Ocean Media`s Business Computing Exhibition (BCE).

The close proximity in dates - BCE at the end of April and CF Johannesburg just two weeks afterwards - has some ITers questioning whether the exhibits may present a bad case of overkill. Can the SA IT business industry cope with more than one IT business showcase and how will potential exhibitors deal with these two exhibitions?

Close to 100 exhibitors have signed up for CF, says CF organisers TML Reed Exhibitions, while Ocean Media says that about 45% of its anticipated exhibitors have confirmed for BCE.

The organisers of both exhibits are understandably secretive of their exhibitor details. Wendy de la Harpe, PR manager of TML Reed Exhibitions, says the company is jealously guarding its list of exhibitors since Ocean Media launched its opposition show.

While conceding that the IT business exhibition market is definitely becoming over-traded, Celeste Abroms, TML Reed Exhibitions manager, says CF will not counter-attack BCE as she believes this will not be beneficial to the IT industry. She notes that CF will instead use its proven track record to ensure that potential exhibitors attend.

Sue van Rooijen, exhibition sales manager of BCE organiser, Ocean Media, says the company will also not be making a conscious effort to counter CF, adding that Ocean Media already has a focused business plan in effect. Van Rooijen believes it is important that potential exhibitors now have a choice of exhibitions to support.

She notes that there is definitely a market for more than one focused IT business exhibition. According to her, CF`s consumer-focused history will count in BCE`s favour, particularly with BCE`s strong spotlight on IT business.

The IT Association of SA (ITA) has also fully endorsed BCE. ITA previously endorsed CF but terminated the relationship when CF became increasingly consumer-based.

CF and BCE did relent to provide some details of selected big name companies that will exhibit. CF has signed up Epson, Telkom and Microsoft, while BCE confirmed IBM, ICL, SAP and Phillips SA as its high profile exhibitors.

Fotini Papoulias, marketing communications for ICL, says that although ICL has exhibited at CF for the last 10 years, it would not be doing so this year and will exhibit at BCE instead. One of the reasons for the switch, Papoulias says, is that BCE will be of more use to ICL`s needs. She adds that CF rates are also a lot higher than those of BCE, and that people and businesses want to go somewhere different.

Julia Becharis, marketing manager for SAP, says that while CF has approached the company to exhibit, SAP would prefer to exhibit at BCE. Becharis also believes that CF is not the right platform for SAP to launch its products and services. She notes that BCE is starting from a fresh perspective, with an immediate focus on the IT business industry, whereas CF has the tradition of being too general.

Abroms disagrees. She says there are various focus areas at CF that lead to smaller niche areas being represented. The argument that business people are offered too broad a scope does not hold water with Abroms, who says that CF has separate halls that focus on particular niche areas.

Hans Dummer, manager, Epson SA, says Epson will stay loyal to CF as the company has virtually been there since the start of CF and there is no possibility that Epson will break with this tradition. Dummer also believes that the SA IT business sector does not need more than one IT business exhibition.

However, Marius van Rensburg, spokesperson for Telkom, says IT business exhibition organisers thoroughly research the needs of its target markets, and are not likely to spend hundreds of thousands of rands organising an exhibition if they fear it will not attract the necessary interest.

Michael Herman, editor-in-chief for Intelligence, says: "It is not good for one company to have a monopoly on exhibitions in South Africa. The impression I get from the people in the industry, however, is that they feel as if they are blackmailed into exhibiting. By this I mean that if their competitors are there, they feel that they have to be there as well. Some companies also believe the money they spend at exhibitions could be better spent on something different."

Nir Grodzian, MD of Creative Labs SA, says his company has not confirmed for CF yet because of CF`s new focus on the IT business sector. Although Creative Labs has been loyal to CF in the past, the company is very consumer-oriented. He says that if the company does exhibit at CF, it will be a marketing exercise. Grodzion believes the SA market cannot deal with more than one IT business exhibition. Instead, he says, there should be one all-encompassing exhibition that focuses on both the consumer market and the business-to-business market.

Peter Aspinall, MD of SBS Conferences, believes CF should stick to its previous formula. While he agrees that competition is good for the industry, he says there is no room for two exhibitions to run in such a close proximity to each other.

* The Business Computing Exhibition takes place at the MTN Sundome from 28 to 30 April. Computer Faire `99 is on at Gallagher Estate from 12 to 15 May.