In 1928, the Brno exhibition grounds were completed. In May 1928, the largest post-war exhibition action - Exhibition on current culture in Czechoslovakia - was launched at it. Brno has acquired the largest exhibition complex in the country ranking among the most modern in Europe thanks to its modern functionalist concept. But it was not until the second half of the 1950's that the Brno entered the international fair scene through organizing three Exhibitions of Czechoslovakian mechanical engineering in the years 1955-57, and notably the first International Engineering Fair in 1959.

Brno fairs until the November 1989 revolution operated within the bounds of the centrally planned economic system as the principal fair exhibition grounds for then Czechoslovakia. In the face of unfavourable times the undertaking Brno Fairs and Exhibitions had managed, while with difficulties, to maintain at least adequately the exhibition grounds and even gradually develop therein its specialisation in fair and exhibition activities.

In the second half of the 1990's the Brno exhibition grounds hold a position of a leading Central European organizer of international fairs. Comparative statistics for major fair management of the Central European region - Poznan, Vienna, Budapest and Bratislava - prove this claim. Naturally, the very business of BVV, a.s., has seen very dynamical developments since the transformation began and no doubt crested in the last two years.

Almost 45 fair and exhibition actions was organized in 1998 by the BVV fair management at the Brno exhibition grounds. The total net rented area exceed the limit of 500,000 m2 for the entire year. Similarly, the number of exhibitors reached the number of over 12,000 firms from 1997. The number of paying visitors for 1998 exceeded the number 900,000. Again, the visitors pattern is dominated by professionals (75 % or so), with the crucial group of competent "entscheidungsträger" visitors accounting for, depending on the type of a fair, 40 - 60 percent of their number in total. Marketing indicators for the effectiveness of fairs held in Brno show on average 85 - 95 % accomplishment of communications and sales objectives of the exhibitors. Pleasing for BVV are structural changes in the exhibition activity of some CEE countries as well as the growing attendance rate from these territories. The average foreign attendance rate for respective international fairs in 1998 runs at 3 - 5 percent of total attendance rate of individual fairs.

Current Brno fairs have worked their way up to their position on the Czech and Central European fair market with a favourable market situation in the first half of the 1990's particularly through their corporate strategy. Besides the very marketing for individual fair products, BVV had to dramatically change first of all the exhibition grounds infrastructure. New pavilions V, E, and the refurbished pavilion G have been erected at the exhibition grounds since 1990. Also erected were roofed overhead passages between the pavilions, carried out other renovation on the existing fair halls and other exhibition grounds premises. Massive investments have been sunk into information technologies and other back-up operations of the exhibition grounds. A new hotel, Holiday Inn, was built up near the exhibition grounds in BVV collaboration, finishing touches are being put to a feeder line on to the exhibition grounds, and a new road on to the Austrian border near Mikulov was commissioned two years ago. The BVV joint-stock company alone was invested from the early 1990's until 1997 up to 2 billion Kč into new structures, equipment, renovation of and repairs to the fair complex and costs of the same type equal to 200 million Kč were invested in 1998. The Brno exhibition grounds have at present a gross exhibition area of 193,000 m2, of which 101,000 m2 is made up of roofed areas within the pavilions, with the technical quality of the exhibition grounds being comfortably comparable with that of Western European exhibition grounds. The Brno exhibitions and fairs organized by BVV can be categorized on a pan-European scale as business by larger fair management. Certain fair projects like Invex - Computer, international gastronomic fairs, Autotec, Autosalón fairs and some other fairs, have put BVV into the top ten fairs of their kind around Europe. The paramount and largest International Engineering Fair will commemorate this year its 40th anniversary. It was initially held in 1959 and the whole specialisation of the Brno fair program has in fact unfolded over time from this. This year we will be organizing for the first time parallely with this fair an International Machine Tools and Forming Machines Fair, which presages future opportunities of the Brno exhibition grounds for co-operation within the CECIMO.

The sale of BVV majority capital (73 %) to the German fair management Messe Düsseldorf resulted from of the last year negotiations. The Brno fair management views this sale as a significant opportunity to make fair business at the Brno exhibition grounds even more international. We believe that this area offers to both partners - BVV and Messe Düsseldorf alike - great possibilities and another market opportunities. Last but not least, account should be taken of the fact that the Czech Republic is preparing to join the European Union to which just Brno fairs in their new strategic alliance may make a significant contribution. The new BVV owner's objective is for Brno fairs to become major fair activities on the Czech and Slovak markets. In order to attain this goal, it will be necessary to further increase the participation of Central and South-Eastern European exhibitors and visitors in Brno fairs. Conversely, BVV may have an important role to play in the promotion of most important fairs right in the Central and South-Eastern European region and become in these reaches, on the other hand, fair partners for the Düsseldorf exhibitors.

The new BVV owner's long term objectives and responsive offers to buy back BVV stocks by the City of Brno, which will have the possibility of buying back over the years to come a 34 % stake of BVV stocks and acquiring for a further 17 % thereof a 5-year option, should be appreciated in the sale of BVV to Messe Düsseldorf.

PhDr. Václav Svoboda
Director for communication Department BVV, a. s.

Slovak Trade FORUM