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Who attended EuroRail 2008?
The 11th annual EuroRail 2008 conference was held for the first time in Italy, at the prestigious Marriott Hotel in Milan. The event again provided the perfect setting for senior executives from railway operators, infrastructure managers, government officials and key industry suppliers to make contacts, discuss current initiatives and plan future developments.
EuroRail 2008 attracted 229 participants, of whom 34 were senior level speakers. An excellent 52% of the audience were representing a railway operator or infrastructure provider.
Of the 229 participants 97% were from senior management and above, 78% were Director/Vice President level and above.
26 different countries around the world were represented. The event did keep it’s European focus though with 96% of participants coming from Europe, 2.5% USA and 1.5% Rest of World.
The marketing campaign was targeted and extensive. Sponsors and exhibitors enjoyed unrivalled branding and marketing exposure to their target audience.
We will continue to deliver the most senior level speakers with varied and thought provoking topics to be added to the 2009 agenda. We will look to grow the size of the exhibition area along with delegate numbers to further balance the buyer vs. supplier ratio. EuroRail 2009 will again see heavily subsidised pricing for delegates representing either a railway operator or infrastructure owner. This initiative resulted in a significant increase in participants from these profiles in 2008.
Programme
The conference programme was very well received. Our research had indicated that high speed rail was the hot topic of the moment and our senior speakers from Europe’s major high speed operators did not disappoint with some excellent insights into the challenges, opportunities and the future of high speed rail.
In response to delegate feedback at EuroRail 2007 we incorporated more CEO level speakers from private operators and infrastructure managers. This brought a new dimension to the event giving insights into issues surrounding liberalisation and competition from the private operator’s perspective and issues such as financing and delivering on key infrastructure projects from the point of view of the infrastructure managers.
The additional day dedicated entirely to freight was again a huge success attracting almost as many delegates as the main event. This gave those whose sole line of business is freight the ideal forum to tackle the key topics surrounding their industry.
Speakers
All the presentations were well received but the top speakers/panellists/moderators as rated by the attendees were as follows:
Ian McAllister, Chairman, Network Rail
James Brathwaite, CBE, Chairman, South East England Development Agency (SEEDA)
Jean-Marc Charoud, Director for Network Development, RFF
Jim Steer, Director, Greengauge 21, Director, Steer Davies Gleave
Thierry Mueller, Manager for Switzerland, TGV Lyria
Béatrice Pâques, Commerical Director, Thalys
Ron Henderson, Group Finance Director, Network Rail
David Maddison, International Airline Account Manager, Airport Express Alliance
Eric Stokhuyzen, Director of Alliances, KLM
Marc van Heumen, Programme Manager, NS HiSpeed
Guy Mason, Chief Information Officer, EWS
Luisa Velardi, Strategy Director, Trenitalia
Julian Smith, Partner, PricewaterhouseCoopers
Testimonials
“EuroRail 2008 was even better than 2007, well done! Looking forward to 2009!”
Philip Martin, Senior Marketing Manager, Amadeus
“Professional and friendly”
Eugenio Dotta, SVP of Sales & Marketing, Ansaldo STS
“A wide range of subjects providing a checkpoint of where the rail industry is and what the future challenges are”
Klaus Kreher, Director of Business Development, Galileo International
“EuroRail 2008 was an excellent chance to participate. It allowed me to get in a time efficient manner a snapshot of the actual trends in the industry and the vision for the future as anticipated by leaders of the market”
Mariam Stoicescu, Account Manager, Hewlett Packard
EuroRail 2008 was sponsored by:
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