Australia’s major mining exhibition was held in the first week of September, in Sydney, and was attended by IM. A record number of visitors – including a big jump in the number of international visitors – showed AIMEX 2007 to be the Asia Pacific’s leading mining industry event. With over 500 exhibitors, more than 12,000 visitors (unaudited) – an increase of 6.2% on the 2003 event – attended the show. Notable was the increase in the number of overseas visitors – up nearly 40% on the previous exhibition, the organisers reported.

“The great majority of our exhibitors have reported an outstanding exhibition, with many of them rebooking or upgrading their stands for AIMEX 2011,” said John Gorton, Director – Industrial Events with organiser Reed Exhibitions. “We had good numbers of visitors from around Australia, as well as delegations from India, China, South America, North America and Russia. More than 15% of visitors were from interstate and over 7% from overseas – firmly indicating that AIMEX is seen as a truly regional exhibition.”

“We’ve also had reports of plenty of business being done at AIMEX, including a number of exhibitors selling high-value equipment off their stands, and others looking to sign major deals with Australian and overseas companies.”

Gorton also said that a number of key organisations used AIMEX to bring suppliers and purchasers together. “Organisations such as Austrade, AustMine and MESCA worked with us very closely to ensure that AIMEX exhibitors were brought together with purchasers from not only around Australia, but internationally,” said Gorton.

“For example, Austrade had delegations from Russia, India, New Caledonia, Indonesia, China, New Zealand, the Philippines and the USA, and organised special networking events for the Indian, Chinese and Russian delegations.

“Over the next four years, we’ll be working to build on these relationships – as well as add-on events, such as our very successful MINING 2020 conference – to ensure AIMEX 2011 is an even better event for our exhibitors and visitors,” he said.

AIMEX 2011 will again be held at Sydney Showground, Sydney Olympic Park, from September 6 to 9, 2011.