WHO IS WHO IN NEW EUROPE’S MEETINGS INDUSTRY
Since 2014, Kongres Magazine has been giving centre stage to the most influential people of New Europe’s meetings industry. When we prepared our first-ever list of influencers, our guidance was the following mindset. Would you decide to build a house without an architect or professional construction workers? The price you would have to pay for the amateur approach would be significant. Likewise, this applies to event organisation, one of the fields of expertise, where everyone seems to be an expert.
Thus, we decided to set structured criteria and requirements for nomination. Our list of influencers differs from similar competitions, as nomination has to come from a third party and not candidates themselves. We want the influencer list to be of help when you start organising events again, serving as a trustworthy directory of MICE professionals. This project is not a competition, but a serious platform that you can rely on. All nominees that were part of the voting process are presented in alphabetical order below.
I would like to sincerely congratulate the winners and all of the nominees on their impressive achievement and pledge to further develop and evolve the project in the following years.
I wish you all a happy and healthy 2021,
Gorazd Čad
Editor in chief
TOP MEETING SERVICES - TECHNOLOGY, MULTIMEDIA, ONLINE PLATFORMS
ALL NOMINEES
In alphabetical order
Lukáš CYPRA, Confer-O-Matic
Lukáš has a sales & business development background, where he spent almost 20 years. In the last 5 years, he has, among other projects, focused on co-organizing several successful events like Happiness@Work and mDevCamp, which in 2020 led to the founding of a new company – Confer-O-Matic. This company created and started delivering Interactive 3D virtual event space for large online events for both internal company events and public events.
Andreas GÖLTL, Media Apparat
Andreas Goeltl started 2004 as visual artist on parties and festivals. His aim was always to push the boundaries of technology and visual design in the event sector. Since 2014 he is CEO of Media Apparat. Media Apparat is a concept and production studio, specializing in the stagings of multimedia performances. Founded in 2009 as a collective for transmedia design, Media Apparat works at the intersection of media, technology and live experience design.
Simon GRABOWSKI, ClickMeeting
Janos FAZAKAS, Visual Europe Group
With shorter and longer detours, he has spent his entire career in the event industry and related fields such as entertainment or communication. He started as a roadie/ AV technician. Worked with performers such as Shakira and The Rolling Stones. Later on, he switched to the agency side, as an event organizer and digital media producer. During this time, he has worked on brands such as MTV, ComedyCentral, Nickelodeon. In 2018, he returned to the event industry now on the management side. As Visual Europe Group’s International Sales Director.
Alexander KRANKL, Lineapp
Alexander Kraenkl is founder and CEO of the innovative and award-winning products auXala and eleXom by LINEAPP GmbH. He visited the academy for communication engineering in Austria and after his degree, he started to work in the audio/video industry. In 2018, Alexander has many years of expertise in technical engineering, due to more than 30 years of involvement in the professional audio industry. Alex’ career started by building-up Sennheiser in Austria and ex-Yugoslavia. The greatest moment during this time was, when Alexander together with his team exclusively supported the Lyconet Elite Conference at O2 arena in Prague, using auXala enterprise to transfer 16 languages to mobile devices of more than 20.000 attendees.
David Lesch, AV MEDIA
Boštjan MATKO, Hiša Vizij
Boštjan Matko has started his professional career in the event industry in 2005 with his partner Zoja Bevc. Due to the combination of Boštjan’s high interest in music and technology and Zoja’s architectural knowledge the Hiša vizij company in 15 years developed into the largest provider of event rental equipment in Slovenia. The Hiša vizij company is specialized in creating exceptional event scenography and technical production. Boštjan Matko with the exceptional team of employees has set the goal to raise the quality of the events in Slovenia to the highest level.
Matjaž MOŽINA, Meetpoint
Matjaž started his knowledge at Si.mobil (now know as A1 Slovenia) for almost 10 years to the latest as the head of mobile solutions. In 2012 he decided on new independent business challenges. He established his own company, where he covers the development of new mobile services, project management, and marketing. He has over fifteen years of experience in telecommunications and mobile solutions, with excellent references for project management and innovation ideas. In 2016, he became a co-founder of startup MeetPoint. He is now devoting most of his time to this project, making the event industry approach as close as possible.
Cemsit YELGIN, Waytation
Despite his super job as a software engineer, Cemsit decided 7 years ago to build a high-tech company in the event industry and has never regretted it since. His personal highlight was equipping the world’s largest industrial trade fair, Hannover Messe 19, with +500 IoT sensors and tracking +20,000 visitors in real-time.
HOW SELECTION AND VOTING FUNCTIONS
Candidates were assessed on the following key criteria:
• Achievement of the best financial and other multiplier effects of the meetings industry in 2019/2020 that were significantly above the average;
• Implementation of the most demanding improvements and innovations in their field, including successfully implemented projects that marked the year 2019/2020 as a special one;
• Help in enhancing the reputation and visibility of the meetings industry in 2019/2020;
• Innovations that facilitate the work of meetings organisers, or have shown the direction for the future.
Based on the criteria, we prepare the list and invite readers of Kongres Magazine to vote. The voting lasts for a month (this year from 13th November to 14th December 2020). In each category, we highlight five influencers with the most votes, while the rest of the nominees are presented equally according to alphabetical order. Each year, colleagues that received less than 2% of all votes are excluded from the list. The 2% was set as the threshold for being placed on the list (52 votes in 2020).
The selection is prepared by the editorial board of Kongres Magazine, consisting of five members. The editorial board ensures a comprehensive overview of nominations and oversees voting results. Thereby, the editorial board assures voting credibility. On request, individuals have the possibility of examining the selection results.
