Each year, we assemble a world-class speaker line up of those who are disrupting the industry to share, debate, discuss and decide the future of live entertainment ticketing.
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The Speaker Line Up
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Nick Dodds
Director FEI (Festival & Events International)
Nick Dodds
Director, FEI (Festival & Events International)
Nick is a leading UK expert on cultural venues, festivals and events and cultural development with 30 years’ experience as a consultant, chief executive, COO and leader in both the commercial and public sectors. His company, FEI, specialises in strategic planning, governance, cultural programming, and business planning for venues, festivals and events internationally.
Nick is currently advising the Georgian Government on developing festivals along the Black Sea coast; recently authored the major study Thundering Hooves 2.0: a ten year strategy to sustain the success of Edinburgh’s Festivals; and has advised governments and organisations worldwide. He was seconded to the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games, as chief operating officer of the London 2012 Festival; was Chief Executive of Brighton Dome and Brighton Festival for eight years; and Administrative Director of the Edinburgh International Festival for ten years.
In 2015 he was given a life-time achievement award by the International Festivals and Events Association, USA, the industry’s highest honour.
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Áron Farkas
International Relations Sziget Cultural Management
Áron Farkas
International Relations , Sziget Cultural Management
Áron is a member of the Sziget Cultural Management’s international relations team since 2014. Working on selling as many tickets as possible for Sziget Festival, Balaton Sound and VOLT Festival all over the world. Sziget Festival is one of the, if not the most international festival there is, with visitors coming from over 100 different countries and a total attendance of 565.000 over it’s 7 day period in 2018.
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Rick Jurkiewicz
Head of Ticketing & Data Protection Officer Rugby Football League
Rick Jurkiewicz
Head of Ticketing & Data Protection Officer, Rugby Football League
Starting in ‘97 at Way Ahead (now ‘SEE’) in Nottingham, Rick moved to lead Ticketmaster’s Client Services team in Manchester in ‘04. 2012 saw Rick move to Ticketmaster’s International Sports division providing technical support for Euro2012, London Olympics, Rugby League and Rugby Union World Cups before being presented with a rare opportunity to join Ticketmaster’s Business Development Team reconnecting once again with Music and Theatre.
Head of Ticketing with a National Governing Body was an obvious next step in his career spent focussed on acquiring experience and my subsequent appointment as Data Protection Officer was a natural extension to Rick’s work in ticketing. -
Isabelle Chevalier
Executive VP Europe Weezevent
Isabelle Chevalier
Executive VP Europe, Weezevent
Isabelle Chevallier as Executive VP Europe is leading the internationalization of Weezevent, with a focus in Europe. Previously, she started her career at Sony Music Entertainment where she quickly progressed from Business Affairs Manager to Executive VP Business Development. Then she followed a change of career abroad with projects in Brazil and Spain to return to music and events with an experience at Intellitix for 4 years.
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Mike Bohndiek
Director/Consultant PTI Consulting
Mike Bohndiek
Director/Consultant, PTI Consulting
Mike formed PTI Consulting with the aim of enabling clubs and venues to access industry specific technology leaders. In the current climate PTI address the considerable digital transformation and strategic technology needs in the sports and entertainment industry.
Having worked across 23 venues in football, rugby, cricket, golf and venues in general over his 14-year career in the sector to date, Mike brings a wealth of knowledge and experience in the ticketing, data and insight space from a provider and customer perspective having built, deployed and operated the platforms behind several club operations and procured industry recognised systems.
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Gajus Kuizinas
CEO and Founder Go2Cinema
Gajus Kuizinas
CEO and Founder, Go2Cinema
Hands-on technology leader known for a good understanding of the entertainment, advertisement and Wi-Fi industries. Over 10 years experience of delivering scalable end-to-end solutions for starts-ups and large corporations. Co-founded Applaudience, an entertainment intelligence company where we combine data mining, data brokerage, and data analysis with strategic communication during the theatrical movie release processes. We own real-time showtime, occupancy, ticket price and film marketing performance data for all major exhibitors in Europe and North America. Our goal is to increase attendance of the existing audiences by enabling data-rich collaboration between exhibitors and distributors.
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Paul Deason
CEO Motorsport Live
Paul Deason
CEO, Motorsport Live
Paul Deason is a graduate in Business Computing & IT. After graduating, he worked for an insurance start-up as a web technologies computer programmer.
In his spare time, he set-up Bookf1.com; an independent ticketing reseller specialising in the motorsport ticketing market. In 2007, Paul left his employment to focus solely on Bookf1.com, which has now grown to be one of the largest motorsport ticketing resellers in the UK.
In 2018, Bookf1.com joined the Motorsport Network and Paul took on the role as CEO of Motorsport Live; a new division tasked with developing international ticketing, experience, and travel services.
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Neetu Bhatia
Co-founder & CEO Kyazoonga, India
Neetu Bhatia
Co-founder & CEO, Kyazoonga, India
An investment banker turned entrepreneur, Neetu is credited with creating the professional entertainment and sports ticketing market in India. Under her leadership, Kyazoonga has expanded rapidly with global operations in the US, Caribbean, Europe, UAE and Australia, and has ticketed some of the largest events, including the recently concluded FIFA U-17 World Cup, An alumnus of MIT, Neetu was a senior investment banker on Wall Street leading teams at Bank of Montreal, Lehman Brothers and McKinsey prior to co-founding Kyazoonga. A former national cricket player, Neetu serves on the Boards of several not-for-profit organizations in New York City and India.
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Daniel Gidney
CHIEF EXECUTIVE LANCASHIRE COUNTY CRICKET CLUB, UK
Daniel Gidney
CHIEF EXECUTIVE, LANCASHIRE COUNTY CRICKET CLUB, UK
An established sports industry CEO for over ten years now, Daniel Gidney launched the first ever cricket bond as part of an innovative £12m fundraising to develop and operate a new 150 bedroom Hilton hotel, which opened in Summer 2017. Daniel’s time at LCCC has generated record profits and the securing of the largest ever naming rights in First Class Cricket, with Emirates. He also secured ECB International matches, including an Ashes Test and a World Cup semi-final in 2019. Daniel was also the 2011 Midlands Business Person of the Year, and the 2014 Trafford Business Person of the Year.
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Carolyn Sims
Director of Marketing & Audience Engagement English National Opera, UK
Carolyn Sims
Director of Marketing & Audience Engagement, English National Opera, UK
What’s (still) wrong with our business?
Carolyn is a highly respected, hands-on, marketing strategist who has worked in a range of entertainment and retail organisations in her career including Ticketmaster, Really Useful, Live Nation Entertainment and Time Out.
Carolyn’s innate ability to be able to put the customer first means that she has forged and shared her skills across a range of customer channels in digital marketing, CRM, audience development and marketing strategies that enable organisations to become profitably customer centric.
Carolyn is an experienced professional in developing and implementing innovative growth strategies through the delivery of customer focused ticketing and commercial excellence. Her passion is for new technologies that provide a great experience for customers to be able to get to and buy the ticket they want.
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Jonathan Brown
CHIEF EXECUTIVE SOCIETY OF TICKET AGENTS & RETAILERS (STAR), UK
Jonathan Brown
CHIEF EXECUTIVE, SOCIETY OF TICKET AGENTS & RETAILERS (STAR), UK
Jonathan is Chief Executive of the Society of Ticket Agents and Retailers (STAR). the self
regulatory body for the entertainment ticket industry. STAR’s membership embraces all
the major primary ticket agents in the UK as well as many venues and supporting
organisations. Members work to a strict code governing high standards of customer
service and information and a dispute conciliation service operates to help resolve customer complaints. STAR also works on behalf of its members through information sharing and cooperation on key matters affecting the ticket industry. Jonathan has represented STAR on ticketing issues in the press and at industry events for many years. -
Tim Chambers
Managing Director TJChambers Consultancy, UK
Tim Chambers
Managing Director, TJChambers Consultancy, UK
Interrogating the industry’s latest start-ups and disruptors
Senior advisor and consultant for ticketing and the business of live entertainment. Career experience includes M&A, strategic development and corporate leadership for various Start-Up’s and PLC. Currently advising a number of international organisations seeking to transform their business operations within the sector. Available for coffee, will travel.
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Ian Nuttall
Founder and CEO TheTicketingBusiness Forum/TheTicketingBusiness News
Ian Nuttall
Founder and CEO, TheTicketingBusiness Forum/TheTicketingBusiness News
Ian Nuttall is the owner and founder of TheTicketingBusiness Forum, presented by his Xperiology events business. His working life began in sports hospitality events management (including Formula 1, horse racing and Wimbledon) before pursuing an award-winning career in B2B magazine publishing. He has co-launched and edited numerous business titles (ranging from energy and industrial processes through to airport design and Intelligent Transportation Systems). He has also founded many of the sports sector’s most respected publications and news sources. In addition to his ongoing commitments as a sports business writer and speaker, Ian provides highly-valued, specialist consultancy to the sports and entertainment venue sector.
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Dr Marcus Garbe
MANAGING PARTNER & FOUNDER TRANSACTION CONSULTING, SWITZERLAND
Dr Marcus Garbe
MANAGING PARTNER & FOUNDER, TRANSACTION CONSULTING, SWITZERLAND
Marcus has over 20 years’ experience as managing director, entrepreneur and consultant. He has profound industry expertise in the live entertainment & ticketing sector, has successfully completed numerous M&A transactions in this field, and worked as advisor for several blue-chip and other companies.
As one of his recent transactions he has been the exclusive advisor for the shareholders of Jetticket Software in the trade sale to CTS-Eventim Group. Previously, Marcus has worked for ifo-institute, Roland Berger 8, Partner, argonauten (WPP), REPLY, Ticketcorner and has founded diverse start-ups.
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Gareth Deakin
Founder Sonorous Global Consulting
Gareth Deakin
Founder, Sonorous Global Consulting
Gareth is a Business Development, Strategy consultant and startup mentor and advisor, helping early-stage companies. He’s the founder of Sonorous Global a consultancy working at the intersection of technology and innovation in the creative and entertainment industries.
Prior to consulting, he was Head Of Business Development for Sony Music where he spearheaded growth in non-traditional revenue streams, including artist ticketing, direct 2 fan commerce and new distribution channels.
From here he headed up strategic partnerships and international development for Canadian start-up Intellitix, focused on creating seamless digital experiences for worlds biggest events, festivals and venues.
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Martin Gammeltoft
VP, Commercial Operations Activity Stream, Denmark
Martin Gammeltoft
VP, Commercial Operations, Activity Stream, Denmark
Activity Stream is a next-generation intelligence and productivity tool improving daily operations and customer experience by combining Business Activity Monitoring and Operational Intelligence with Enterprise Activity Streams and Data Visualisation, in a unique 4-in-1 solution, helping businesses become truly data-driven.
Martin is heading the commercial side of things at Activity Stream and is responsible for the Live Entertainment vertical. He comes from a background in concert services and ticketing and is passionate about helping venues and organisers exploit the many benefits of data, without having to take in the full complexity.
Who will be there
- Our Sponsors
- Our Partners
- Our Attendees
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Softjourn
We know ticketing! Softjourn is a technology services provider, which has established its credibility in building highly functional ticketing applications for 15 years with Ticketmaster, Live Nation, Vendini, Etix, Event Espresso, EzTix, Ticketprinting.com, and many others. Our clients come to us because they do not have to explain to us how the users work, what’s a Box office app, why is offline mode important etc., it means we can more quickly get up to speed on any new ticketing service.
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Due to our expertise, we collaborate with our clients, by suggesting new functionality, how to apply new technology to the industry, how to let people in faster and much more. This helps our clients remain competitive or enable them to go after additional market share and bring in more revenue. -
Keyper
keyper provides white labeled technology for easy and secure sharing and selling of tickets by connecting the existing ticketing solutions with mobile platforms. keyper enables sports clubs to solve their “No-Show” problem, connect their full audience, gain more relevant data and increase overall revenue.
www.keyper.io
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Token RFID
Token is a global provider of advanced RFID solutions, pioneering a new age of cashless payments, access control and experiential activations for venues and events. Token was founded by event technology veterans, Simon Guerrero and Matthew James, who are also co-founders of Ticketbooth – one of the leading ticketing software providers in Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. Pairing their comprehensive understanding of the event industry, engineering experience and extensive investigation of similar platforms, Guerrero and James have developed and launched an industry-leading RFID technology platform. Partnered worldwide with event organisers, ticketing companies, agencies and venues, Token provides an end-to-end RFID solution – from the distribution of wristbands, intelligent software and hardware, cashless payment solutions and onsite social media and brand activations. This technology has proven to increase attendee spend per head, introduce additional revenue streams and sponsorship opportunities, whilst simultaneously enhancing attendee satisfaction and the on-site experience for patrons. In response to growing global demand, Token has also recently opened two new offices in the UK and USA, in addition to its headquarters in Australia. Token is also accepting proposals for global venue and agency partnerships.
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SecuTix
SecuTix is a technology provider of a Ticketing Engagement Platform that helps organisations boost ticket sales and enhance audiences’ experience before, during and after live events. Our product, SecuTix 360°, is a cloud-based platform that combines ticketing and marketing functionality, and is offered as a white label SaaS service. Used by the largest sport clubs and stadiums, live entertainment businesses, and leading museums and cities across Europe, SecuTix manages the yearly sales of more than 30 million tickets. Among our clients are Opéra National de Paris, UEFA, Centre Pompidou, Aspro Parks, Saracens FRC, Paléo Festival, Musée Picasso Paris and many more. A daughter company of the ELCA Group, SecuTix has a local presence in Switzerland, France, Spain, Germany, UK / Irl., Italy and USA.
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3D Digital Venue
3D Digital Venue, powered by MMC, provides Interactive Digital Venue Management Solutions to Sports and Entertainment Venues across the globe. With our 3D Digital Venue technology platform we design need based solutions for our clients providing them a robust, precise and interactive recreation of their Venue to deliver greater fan satisfaction, increase season ticket holder renewal rates, activate new channels of digital sponsorship and provide special viewing experiences for prospective VIP buyers. The primary capabilities of our 3D Digital Venue Platform include: Ticketing3D to Enhance Ticket Sales and Fan Purchase Experience using our interactive 3D Seat Views from all Blocks and Seats; 3D Season Tickets achieve higher renewal rates from season ticket holders by offering 360 degree 3D Views of the seats even before existing venue is refurbished or a new stadium is built; Activation3D, an Interactive Environment to activate Measurable Digital Sponsorship by Product Placement inside our 3D Views & VIP3D, to provide world-class Interactive Experience to prospective VIPs and Corporate Clients with fully 3D Customised views of Luxury Suites and Premium Club Hospitality Areas. Our 3D Digital Venue Platform provide you the most complete, interactive and cutting edge Venue Management Solutions
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HID Global
HID Global is the trusted leader in products, services and solutions related to the creation, management and use of secure identities for millions of customers worldwide.
Recognised for robust quality, innovative designs and industry leadership, HID Global is focused on creating customer value and is the supplier of choice for OEMs, integrators and developers serving a variety of markets that include physical access control; IT security, including strong authentication/credential management; card personalisation; visitor management; government ID; and identification technologies for a range of applications. HID Global is an ASSA ABLOY Group brand.
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Oxynade
Oxynade, a 100% eTicketing as a Service (eTaaS) partner, offers an all-round ticketing system that is based on the current top-notch technologies such as GraphQL, Node JS and React. Including a fully equipped back-office, box office and specialised features, like a FMS, the platform can cover the needs of a broad range of verticals. This allows their partners in the ticketing sector to grow their business and reach possibilities that were out of scope before. Having a white label solution within its core, where they customise their solution and make it a part of their clients own brand, turned out to be a real hit. With new players like artists, music promotors and even tour operators getting involved in ticketing, white label is just the way to go. All of those partnerships are based on the same Oxynade technology, focused on local ticketing needs and are targeting other/multiple segments. Since their eTaaS solution has been launched in the beginning of 2017 they have already expanded their portfolio with 14 new clients. The Netherlands, Germany, the Baltics, Hungaria, Czech Republic and even South Africa are just a few of the countries that they have conquered.- View Website -
Activity Stream
Activity Stream is a next-generation intelligence and productivity tool improving daily operations and customer experience by combining Business Activity Monitoring and Operational Intelligence with Enterprise Activity Streams and Data Visualisation, in a unique 4-in-1 solution, helping businesses become truly data-driven.
- View Website -
PACIFA Decision
PACIFA decision is a 6-year old European company which creates and develops innovative solutions to help venue Managers in their daily work.
We work in staff optimisation and crowd control and are linked to ticketing, access control and cctv. Our groundbreaking 3D technologies allow reduced operational costs while improving ticketing and hospitality revenues.
We are 20 team-mates fully dedicated to permanently upgrading our existing tools and inventing new ones to always be on the cutting-edge of innovations. Our various origins and partnerships allow us to manage up to 9 languages (French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, German, Slovakian, Polish and Russian) because our willingness is to be in direct contact with your own managing teams; in order to work closely together in a friendly and collaborative way, instead of being a basic supplier.
Our existing references are our best ambassadors to testify our product works and it is worth the investment!
You can find more information on our website www.pacifa-decision.com or follow us on Twitter @PACIFAdecision.
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Event Genius
Based in the UK and servicing events across Europe, Event Genius’ unrivalled Cashless and POS solution (Event Genius Pay), reserved seating and other online ticketing services provide an end-to-end platform for arenas, theatres, stadiums, sports clubs, exhibitions or conferences looking to improve their fan experience. To find out more, visit our pod where our team will be on hand to demonstrate how these services and white-label solutions can provide your organisation with meaningful data of your fans purchasing journey, from tickets, to tills and beyond.
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TixTrack
TixTrack provides web-based software for planning, tracking, and optimising revenue from events. The company’s proprietary purchasing and data analysis tools increase its clients’ revenues by tracking inventory status and accurately determine the correct ticket price. Customers include event promoters such as Cirque du Soleil, FELD Entertainment, Nederlander and venues such as Air Canada Centre and The Verizon Center; and sports teams such as The Los Angeles Clippers, New York Islanders and Chicago Cubs.
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Aventus
Alan Vey and Annika Monari launched the Aventus Foundation, which is a Jersey based, non-profit entity whose mission is to develop and market the open-source Aventus blockchain protocol, and grow the associated ecosystem. Neither the foundation nor its partners derive revenue from the protocol itself. Alan and Annika have focused on building and launching the first version of the protocol during the first part of 2018, with CTO Andy Grant joining them in August 2017. In 2018 Alan and Annika followed-up with the launch of Artos Systems Limited to provide a commercial SaaS proposition, in order to deliver tools, blockchain API connectivity and analytics to businesses involved in the ticketing supply chain – Promoters, Venues, Primary and Secondary Ticketing Agents. To successfully launch and grow Artos Systems Limited, and engage with customers and partners, COO, Rob Edwards and CMO, Andrew Ford, joined the business in February 2018.
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Intechnica
TrafficDefender – Seamlessly manage peaks in traffic with guaranteed website uptime. The enterprise-class online queueing system that protects your website during high rates of traffic by controlling the flow of visitors to your site, keeping them informed in an interactive customer engagement portal.
A highly scalable, simple implementation with 100% uptime since release; TrafficDefender’s inline implementation protects your entire web infrastructure. It also automatically blocks malicious bot traffic from stealing sales from valued customers and consuming infrastructure resources.
Customers include The Voice, EventCube, BookingShow, and others such as AO.com, Ted Baker, JD Williams, Scribbler, Hobbs, The White Company and hundreds more. Intechnica are web performance and scalability experts, protecting some of the largest ticketing platforms in the world. Founded in 2006, the company is head quartered in Manchester, UK, and supports customers around the globe.
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Tixserve
Tixserve is a secure ticket fulfilment platform for existing ticket sellers in sport, music and theatre. Tixserve delights consumers, fixes ticket abuse problems, reduces costs and generates new revenue streams for our B2B clients via a patent-pending interactive digital ticket delivered to smartphones.
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TheTicketingBusiness Awards
TheTicketingBusiness Awards are set to be the highlight of the Forum, with the winners announced in front of an audience of senior industry figures during a private, gala dinner.
The Awards were launched in order to:
- Recognise leadership, innovation & achievement in the application of technology in ticketing across sports, performing arts, music, cinema, live entertainment and visitor attractions.
- Increase the standards and best practice of ticketing.
- Drive awareness and adoption of future ticketing technology.
- Improve the customer experience for ticket-buyers across all sectors.
Hundreds of nominations will be whittled down to create the shortlists. The winner of each category will be decided either by online voting by the global ticketing industry or by the independent TheTicketingBusiness Awards judging panel.
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TheTicketingBusiness News
All the latest ticketing business news, blogs, videos, and up-to-the-minute media coverage from all the leading voices in the ticketing business industry, all in one place. Curated and brought to you by the TheTicketingBusiness Forum.
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STAR
The Society of Ticket Agents and Retailers (STAR), is the representative body for the UK ticketing industry, promoting consumer confidence and excellent service through a strict Code of Practice.
STAR’s membership includes ticket agencies, West End and regional theatres, arenas, music venues, travel companies and many others in the ticketing industry. Sales through STAR members represent over 90% of UK theatre and music ticket sales (over a million tickets per week).
With widespread support and recognition from entertainment venues, promoters and producers as well as law enforcement and government, STAR has been at the forefront of cross-industry initiatives to improve consumer confidence, combat fraud and make ticket buying safer for the past twenty years.
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Dewynters
We’re the world’s leading arts & live entertainment marketing specialists. Based in London and with our sister agencies in New York and Germany, we produce some of the most creative, iconic and longest running campaigns in live entertainment.
From theatre and concerts to tours, exhibitions and arena events, our 90-strong dynamic team knows instinctively how to engage, inspire and excite your audience across all platforms, and understands exactly how to turn your event into the hottest ticket in town.
And with all our services under one roof, our strategies are beautifully designed and seamlessly integrated, allowing us to react in the blink of an eye.
We’re bursting with ideas and passion and we think there’s always more to discover, new ways to think, greater things to achieve.
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What are people saying?
The best networking place I've been to. I was able to get very high level leads and meet relevant partners. You did a great great job to gather such high level and exhaustive people!
Chloé Julien Founder & CEO, BandSquare, France
CIOs, CTO,s Chief Execs... all those people turn up at this event. it’s a fantastic opportunity to engage with them
Rick Jurkiewicz Head of Ticketing, The Rugby Football League, UK
This is the focal point of the ticketing industry in Europe, where the decision-makers meet and exchange ideas
Niels Henrik Sodemann Managing Partner/CEO, Queue-it, Denmark
At the Forum we made concrete progress with regards to selecting a new ticketing provider. I would be happy to recommend the Forum to other venues in the future.
Martin O'Donoghue Business Development Manager, Cork Opera House, Ireland
If you’re curious about the future, if you want to see how things are developing, if you wanna get to know your peers... you need to be at the Forum.
James Charrington CEO, Dewynters, UK
For me the most important thing was to meet with all the different companies in ticketing and I’ve managed that, and I left with many business cards!