IITELMIT sees transaction value at $40m
Rendi A. Witular The Jakarta Post Jakarta
The third Indonesian International Telecommunication Media and Information Technology (IITELMIT) conference and exhibition ended on Friday with total transactions estimated to reach around US$40 million.
The four-day event was organized by PT Rantai Expo International (REI), a local subsidiary of the UK-based International Trade and Exhibition Group Plc.
REI general manager Juanita Soerakoesoemah said that despite the heartening transaction value, the number of exhibitors and visitors declined this year compared to last year's event.
She said that this year, only 130 companies took part in the exhibition, occupying some 3,500 square-meters of the Jakarta Convention Center.
In comparison, the number of participating companies last year totaled 207, occupying a greater area of around 5,326 sqm.
Juanita said that the lower number of exhibitors was mainly due to the current global economic slowdown, which had forced companies to reduce their participation in exhibitions and other promotional activities as they had cut their promotion and advertising budget.
She said that the number of visitors dropped to about 19,000 from some 24,733 last year.
She explained that the lower number of visitors was expected as the organizer had been focussing more on quality visitors for this year's event.
"The reduction is not due to our (lack of) promotion, since we allocated a higher promotion budget than last year. Day one and two were limited only for businesspeople, while day three and four were for the public. The downsizing of visitors is not a problem since we were targeting quality instead of quantity," added Juanita.
With its first exhibition in 2000, IITELMIT is Indonesia's largest annual exhibition of cutting edge telecommunication technologies and services.
Under this year's theme of "IITELMIT, Indonesia's Window on the Future", the exhibition displayed the latest telecommunication devices, network infrastructure products and newest IT solutions.
IITELMIT is the showcase of choice for multinational and domestic businesses operating in Indonesia, since, as an added attraction it also hosted a seminar simultaneously with the exhibition featuring prominent speakers such as the State Minister of Communication and Information, Syamsul Muarif, and the president of state-owned telecommunication company PT Indosat, Hari Kartana.