Germany 2022: Bold move off the beaten track

Hamburg Messe und Congress will be launching a new event format on the future of mobility together with OMR in 2022. It will give both visionaries and key players a huge stage.

Hamburg is northern Germany’s mobility hub, an official EU model region for urban airborne mobility and the “RealLab for Digital Mobility”. In future, the metropolis on the Elbe will also be the host city of the “Bold Moves - New Mobility Summit”. Next spring, this “bold move” will make its debut during the OMR festival for digital marketing and technology. Designed as a festival and congress, the event will cover all mobility-related topics. Its first edition addresses experts, decision-makers in research, business and politics, as well as influencers and start-ups. In future, the summit is to take place annually, with yearly updates integrating additional formats and plans to eventually make the event accessible to the general public.

Hamburg Messe und Congress had previously collaborated with OMR on the Hanseatic city's bid for IAA 2021. They then both used their original concept to develop the new event format. For this purpose, they decided to leave the beaten track and conventional approaches to designing industry events. “What the future of mobility will look like concerns us all,” says Bernd Aufderheide. “We would like to give this topic a huge new stage that is completely unique,” says the CEO of Hamburg Messe und Congress.

To be more specific, this means involving everyone who has the potential to contribute to the mobility transition. “This expressly includes partners whose names may not be the first that come to mind when thinking about mobility,” points out Aufderheide. “Our goal is to establish a leading international event for zero-carbon mobility.” The concept also includes a community platform moderated by an editorial team year-round, as well as podcasts and other dialogue and communication channels. “Bold Moves will provide a platform for the mobility scene to interact and network, share information and get inspired,” says Philipp Westermeyer, founder of OMR (www.omr.com).

The safety of visitors and exhibitors is the top priority at Internorga in March 2022. The international trade fair for the out-of-home market will therefore be adopting the ‘vaccinated or recovered’ rule: “We will only admit people to Internorga who are vaccinated against or recovered from COVID,” says Bernd Aufderheide, CEO of Hamburg Messe und Congress. A previously conducted survey of exhibitors who have already registered shows that the ‘vaccinated or recovered’ rule is their preferred option. “The result was emphatically in favour of the rule, with 72 per cent expressing support,” says Aufderheide. “Following the survey, we held in-depth talks with the exhibitor advisory board and our partners, and ultimately decided to go with what is currently the safest option.” This means there will be no social distancing requirement anywhere on the exhibition grounds and no requirement to wear face coverings. Exhibitors will be able to serve food and drinks or offer tasting samples at their stands without any restrictions. In addition, no minimum distance will need to be observed between tables at the stands and there will be no limits on the number of people per table. Neither will there be any limit on the number of attendees in the halls (www.hamburg-messe.de).