A Change
in 'Exhibition Culture'
Korea International Exhibition Center President-CEO Kim In-shik

Exhibitions are the flower of marketing because they are the most effective marketing means. It serves as a marketplace where multiple buyers directly contact suppliers. Germany is the most developed exhibition country with exhibitions handling 60 percent to 70 percent of its trade volume. Ninety-one percent of American companies consider exhibitions as opportunities to explore the most important buyers. In Korea, 52 percent of SMES participate in overseas exhibitions, a lion's share in their overseas marketing activities.
Countries, both developed and those developing, are strengthening government support for the exhibition industry, which is classified as an area of promoting trade, allowing government subsidies under the World Trade Organization regime. In Asia, Singapore and Hong Kong have evolved into Southeast Asian logistics and distribution centers after adopting the exhibition industry as their strategic industrial field in the early 1990s. Recently, China's central and provincial governments have followed suit.
Recognizing the significance of the exhibition industry albeit belatedly, Korea has designated the exhibition industry as one of strategic industrial sectors to be developed under its Northeast hub project. Exhibitions should become not only a marketplace for companies, but serve as an infrastructure for supporting Korea's trade. As of the end of 2005, Korea posted $284.7 billion exports and $261.2 billion imports for a $23.5 billion trade surplus. The nation, which has already surpassed the $500 billion mark in foreign trade, is heading toward the $1 trillion trade era. It is not far away when Korea will see its global trading ranking rising to top 8 from the current top 12. However, Korea's travel volume accounts for 2.4 percent of global total, whereas our exhibition industry takes up a mere 0.8 percent share in the global market, not enough to perform its role as trade infrastructure. Now our exhibition industry needs to become an arena for publicizing companies and promoting their marketing and exchanges of information so that our nation's profile can be enhanced.

"PREARED WITH FACILITIES DESIGNED TO HOLD EXHIBITIONS OF A GLOBAL SCALE ― Many Korean companies have born huge expenses to participate in overseas exhibitions. "Why does it seem that Korea cannot organize international exhibitions?"many say unhappily. The major reason Korea has failed to organize exhibitions of an international scale is the lack of exhibition facilities of an international scale. There are many exhibition centers in the Seoul metropolitan area and regions, but they lack an international scale. With the opening of KINTEX, Korea's largest exhibition area with combined floor space of 54,000 sq. meters, Korea has the infrastructure to hold international exhibitions of a world-class scale. The first phase of the KINTEX project has now opened, and the second and third phase would raise its exhibition space to 178,000 sq. meter, making KINTEX one of largest ones in both Asia and the world.

Our neighbor countries are ahead of Korea in terms of the construction of exhibition centers and scale. Shanghai's New International Exhibition Center in Pudong, Shanghai (SNTEC), constructed by a joint venture by three German exhibition centers and the Shanghai municipal government, has an exhibition space of 85,000 sq. meters. SNTEC has an ambitious plan to expand its facilities to 200,000 sq. meters before the opening of the 2010 Shanghai Expo. Guangzhou in southern China and Beijing in northern China have built large-scale exhibition centers to take exhibitions both from Asia and other parts of the world. Hong Kong has an addition to the existing Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center (HKCEC) AsiaWorld Expo. In Singapore, the existing Singapore Expo has its exhibition space expanded to 100,000 sq. meters. The countries have been scrambling for the construction of exhibition centers.

'NEW EXHIBITION CULTURE'― President Roh Moo-hyun disclosed a plan to foster the convention and exhibition industry as Korea's strategic industrial sector during his speech during the opening ceremony for KINTEX, saying that the industry is a value-added sector combining business and tourism and a fertile soil for the development of advanced industries. In reality, recognizing the importance of the convention and exhibition industry, the Korean government has implemented institutional systems and budgetary support for the cultivation of the industry, after designating the sector as one of national strategic industrial fields. The convention and exhibition industry requires government support as a key national industry.
With the opening of KINTEX, the domestic convention and exhibition industry has undergone quantitative and qualitative changes. A stumbling block in the development of the industry is too small in the scale of domestic exhibitions. Global exhibition trends show that the bigger exhibitions fare well. About 70 percent of exhibitions being held across the nation are small-sized with less than 10,000 sq. meters in exhibition space, and those of an international scale with more than 20,000 sq. meters account for a mere 5 percent. As part of its efforts to address the problem, KINTEX has gained synergetic effects by promoting co-location of similar shows. Co-location of Seoul Int'l Food Show and coinciding of Korea Machinery Fair 2005, Seoul Int'l Tool & related Equipment Exhibition 2005 and Korea Machinery Fair 2005 have witnessed exhibitors and spectators rising by 20 to 30 percent.
Korea's exhibition centers suffered structural and size problems in holding exhibitions in the automobile, machinery and IT industries with an international competitive edge, but Korea has shown the potential to develop an excellent Korea Brand.
The opening of KINTEX has created a new demand. The convention and exhibition center, about the size of six soccer stadiums combined, can hold indoor events capable of accommodating 60,000 to 70,000 people. It is evolving "a new exhibition culture"by holding events for individual companies and large-scale performances.

FIERCE COMPETITION ― China, dubbed as a global manufacturing plant, is considered as a black hole in the global convention and exhibition industry. In the past, European and North American countries became global convention and exhibition centers. Its gravity is shifting to Asia centering on China. As the global convention and exhibition industry is undergoing reorganization with China at the center, Korea will have to take emergency measures designed to ensure international competitiveness of the domestic industry. Starting with our mainstay industries with a competitive edge, Korea should make domestic conventions bigger and internationalized, and promote co-location of similar exhibitions in a bid to enhance Korea's exhibition brand power. Domestic convention and exhibition centers are required to maintain strategic partnerships with prominent global counterparts and exhibition companies. They need to jointly organize conventions and exhibitions with foreign exhibition institutions to ensure market-opening and change them with the ones having a bigger and international presence. nw

A general view of the vast KINTEX

KINTEX President Kim In-shik