A Change of Seasons

An agreement hammered out by a committee called the Trade Show Task Force, consisting of the industry’s associations and execs, calls for the SCTE‘s Emerging Technologies Conference and Cable-Tec Expo to shift seasons.

Beginning in 2009, ET will occur in the spring during the same week and in the same location as the NCTA‘s Cable Show and CableLabs‘ Conference, among others. Expo will move to the fall, joining events including the CTAM Summit, CableLabs’ Conference, and the NCTA Board of Directors Meeting.

The call for change has been driven by travel-weary execs and frustrated vendors and marketing folks who have found it difficult in recent years to keep up with the demands of an ever-growing trade show circuit that placed two of the biggest events practically back-to-back.

The Cable Show and Cable-Tec Expo taking place just weeks apart has been challenging for execs because of time and travel constraints and for vendors, who would like the opportunity to launch new products at each of these major shows, said SCTE Chairman Tom Gorman, noting that the SCTE will not lose any independence from the scheduling changes. No identity crisis "Expo will always be Expo," Gorman said. "We will market it as Expo, not as a conjoined event. We will in some cases be co-located with other associations that week and in some cases will be across town. We think that existing in the same week as the CTAM summit, for example, will bring more marketing folks on to the Expo floor, and that engineers can then participate with them, too, as CTAM also holds technical and technology sessions for their constituents."

For the SCTE, the changes are largely national in scope. "Regional activities and chapter meetings are not affected in that they are not expected to ‘align’ with any changes. There are some chapters that have traditionally held fall events that may shift so as to not conflict with Expo," Gorman said.

As for 2008, the remaining conference schedule will stay the same. Expo will take place as planned in Philadelphia, June 24-27. In 2009, the SCTE will celebrate its 40th anniversary in Denver at a fall Expo.

"I can’t think of a better way to start the next 40 years than with a new vision, a new partnership with other industry organizations, and even a new time slot in the year," Gorman wrote in a release.

– Monta Monaco Hernon