Editor’ s Note
Of acquisitions, AI and mapping of the future
he trade fair M & A market has certainly fired up
T in 2026 with momentum continuing illustrated by three July acquisitions from Hyve( RAISE Summit, Machina Summit and Signal Week, following on from recent deals for LegalTechTalk and Virtuosi League). CEO Mark Shashoua shares more on Hyve’ s strategy on p39, while you can read deeper M & A analysis from John McGovern on p11, who notes that for every one of the platform deals being done involving private equity there are multiple smaller bolt-on deals.
The value of quality face-to-face events is clearly coming into ever starker contrast, alongside a rapidly advancing AI era. Money is pouring into AI but is that sustainable and at what point will the bill for that come to the consumer and how?
I encourage you all to read the article by data and industry reearch expert Mark Parsons, p36-37, in which he draws a map to remind us that the exhibition is not a legacy format awaiting disruption, but rather the residue that remains after 175 years of disruption have already happened. He concludes with a challenging question:“ If every revolution so far has re-founded the exhibition rather than killed it, what is AI stripping away right now, and what will be left?”
Our industry has many entrepreneurs and influencers shaping our exhibition future as our front cover attempts to illustrate and you can hear from Raccoon’ s Running Man Mike Seaman, on p12, on his plans for a new PadelXpo as his company celebrates its 10th anniversary, while Phil Soar, p41, is on the ball as ever and brings us back to the incredible M & A wave with some Premier League analysis on how exhibition companies are becoming trophy assets. Exhibitions are clearly in rude health in general, but the feature, p24-25, from RE Rogers on how the company diversified its Indian event logistics business onto the live music stage is an interesting lesson in finding new markets and exploiting transferable skills. EW
Paul Colston Editor X: @ ExhibitionWorld Instagram: @ ew _ magazine
Managing Editor: Paul Colston; Portfolio Director: Iain Stirling. International Marketing Executive: Jack Belcher. International Account Director: Myran Balasingham. Graphic Design: The Magazine Production Company. Contact us: Subscriptions:+ 44( 0) 20 8481 1128, Editorial: + 44( 0) 20 8481 1152, Advertising: + 44( 0) 20 8481 1122, Production:+ 44( 0) 20 8971 1132. Exhibition World is published by Mash Media, Second floor, Applemarket House, 17 Union Street, Kingston Upon Thames, KT1 1RP, UK. Tel: + 44( 0) 20 8481 1122 fax: + 44( 0) 20 8481 1144, Email: info @ mashmedia. net Views expressed are not necessarily those of the publishers. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the express written permission of the publishers. Printed by Pensord Press Ltd.
www. exhibitionworld. co. uk Issue 3 2026 5