Coronavirus

In response to the country’s recent Omicron wave, New Zealand recently moved to its "Red Traffic light" setting — halting large-scale gatherings and impacting the local events industry. The decision has received some pushback; we explore why.

The recent Consumer Electronics Show had some of the most comprehensive health and safety measures ever provided by an event of its size. But CES' failure to report the number of Covid cases detected in Las Vegas is drawing criticism and raising an important question for planners about whether events have an obligation to report cases to the general public.

The recent emergence of Omicron, a new Covid variant of concern, has sent shockwaves through global markets and led to the WTO conference being postponed days ahead of the planned meeting in Geneva. How concerned should event planners be?

Predatory conferences are bogus events that exist to sell tickets using everything from shoddy registration pages to unconfirmed speakers. With the flush of virtual events during the pandemic, the situation may be getting worse.

Mobile technology is sure to play a critical role in our much-desired return to in-person events, yet event apps are currently not top of mind. Will they be used to help ensure a covid-safe environment? If so, can planners force all attendees to use them?

Many have championed Australia and New Zealand for their zero-Covid policy. Crowds of 30,000 daily spectators at the Australian Open reinforce the impression of success. Why, then, do survey results show an event industry on the brink of collapse?

Does the fate of the exhibition industry rest on the successful rollout of the vaccine? The latest data from UFI certainly shows a correlation, but according to UFI CEO Kai Hattendorf, exhibitions are already safe — we just need to get everyone on board.

Event companies have been struggling to stay afloat since the beginning of the pandemic. In particular, event tech giant Eventbrite has experienced sharp earnings declines throughout 2020, which continued in the third quarter — but there is hope for recovery.

In August, Germany performed an experiment with 1,500 participants to understand how the Coronavirus spreads at events. Here are the results.