Aspectus PR’s B2B Event Marketing team was in Germany this week to support our client PennWell at its flagship energy conference and exhibition POWER-GEN Europe and its co-located events Renewable Energy World Europe and Nuclear Power Europe.

This year marked the 20^th anniversary of POWER-GEN Europe, which held its inaugural event in Paris in 1993. Back then there were only 100 exhibitors; today, the Koelnmesse in Cologne hosted more than 600! And being the third year Aspectus has managed the pan-European PR for POWER-GEN Europe, it was great to see it continues to go from strength to strength, attracting major players from across the energy sector.

POWER-GEN Europe kicked off with a fascinating joint opening keynote session delivered to a packed conference hall. Following an introduction by conference director Nigel Blackaby, Bernard Fischer, CEO of E.ON Generation GmbH, Michael Süβ, CEO of Siemens Energy Sector, Germany, and Laszlo Varro, head of the IEA’s Gas, Coal and Power Division shared their visions for the future of the energy industry.

On the second day of the conference, Aspectus PR’s chairman Bill Penn presented on the evolving role PR is playing in the energy sector. Bill talked about the importance of adopting an integrated social media and traditional public relations campaign – a particularly pertinent topic given that Aspectus manages the Twitter and LinkedIn accounts for PennWell’s three events.

With the press room buzzing all week with journalists drawn to the show from across Europe, it was also fantastic to have the opportunity to once again catch up face-to-face with many of our colleagues at PennWell, who we spend so much time with on the phone during the run-up to the event and many of whom came all the way from Tulsa in the US to attend.

The event closed with a speech from Drazen Miletic, the commercial attaché for the Austrian embassy, who announced that the Messe Wien in Vienna, Austria will be hosting next year’s POWER-GEN Europe. We look forward to continuing our relationship with PennWell and we hope to see some of you in Vienna next year!