ISE 2017: Day 2 Impressions – 70,000-Plus Attendees

February 9, 2017 by Dave Haynes

I saw very little Wednesday because I was running around to various meetings, and most of free time was invested in figuring out where the hell I was.

The venue for ISE is nicer in just about every respect than the big trade show halls in Las Vegas, New York and Orlando, the Amsterdam RAI has 14 halls, interconnected by a bewildering maze of hallways, steps, ramps and so on. I have a really good sense of direction (and I have some great words, tremendous words), but the RAI has defeated me repeatedly in the last three days.

Anyway, people like the show in general, as evidenced by the numbers.

Attendance was 65,000 last year and the show’s organizers say there were already 68,544 registered attendees at the start of the week, and on-site registration will put that north of 70,000.

Exhibitor totals are also up, growing by 90 to 1,193 for 2017. Almost half of those have digital signage in their description, but some of those are kinda sorta barely in this sector, and just ticked that box when doing their exhibitor list descriptions.

Floor space is now more than 500,000 square feet, which in US terms is like a couple of giant Walmart SuperCenters stuck together – except in this case a bunch of smaller pods all tied together in ways that will make most people crazy.

More time today to look around, especially in Hall 8 – which is signage land.