FOUR solid days of business for exhibitors and visitors and a record number of visitors — including a big jump in the number of international visitors — have cemented AIMEX 2007 as the Asia Pacific’s leading mining industry event.
With over 500 exhibitors, more than 12,000 visitors — an increase of 6.2% on the 2003 event — attended the show held at the Sydney Showground, Sydney Olympic Park from September 4 to 7.
A notable trend was an increase in the number of overseas visitors to AIMEX 2007 — up nearly 40% on the previous exhibition, and establishing it as a truly international mining show.
“The great majority of our exhibitors have reported an outstanding exhibition, with many of them rebooking or upgrading their stands for AIMEX 2011,” said John Gorton, Director — Industrial Events with organiser Reed Exhibitions.
“We had good numbers of visitors from around Australia, as well as delegations from India, China, South America, North America and Russia.
“Our unaudited visitor breakdown shows we had a total of 12,367 visitors over the four days — an increase of 6.2% over AIMEX 2003.
“More than 15% of visitors were from interstate and over 7% from overseas — firmly indicating that AIMEX is seen as a truly regional exhibition.
“This reflects growth of more than 17% in interstate visitors compared with 2003, and nearly 40% growth in international visitors — who represented a total of 38 countries,” he said.
A fully audited report on visitor numbers, where they came from, types of business and job descriptions will be provided to all exhibitors within three months.
“We’ve also had reports of plenty of business being done at AIMEX, including a number of exhibitors selling high-value equipment off their stands, and others looking to sign major deals with Australian and overseas companies.”
Gorton said that a number of key organisations used AIMEX to bring suppliers and purchasers together.
“Organisations such as Austrade, AustMine and MESCA worked with us very closely to ensure that AIMEX exhibitors were brought together with purchasers from not only around Australia, but internationally,” said Gorton.
“For example, Austrade had delegations from Russia, India, New Caledonia, Indonesia, China, New Zealand, the Philippines and the USA, and organised special networking events for the Indian, Chinese and Russian delegations.
“Over the next four years, we’ll be working to build on these relationships — as well as add-on events, such as our very successful MINING 2020 conference — to ensure AIMEX 2011 is an even better event for our exhibitors and visitors,” he said.
AIMEX 2011 will again be held at Sydney Showground, Sydney Olympic Park, from September 6 to 9, 2011.
For more information on AIMEX 2011, contact Soren Norgaard, email soren.norgaard@reedexhibitions.com.au or visit www.aimex.com.au.