INSIGHT EVENT TECH
MEETING EXPECTATIONS
There are signs the event tech goldrush is already over. How quickly organisers harness the potential of online meetings will determine the size of any future returns…
BY WILLIAM THOMSON
vent technology companies have waved the good times goodbye. Buoyed by the asset bubble and the
companies in the United States, sat below 3000 points. By the end of 2021, as the world slowly exited a pandemic, the index was at a historic high of 4725. Information technology companies accounted for around 28 per cent of the 500 companies. Only a month earlier, the Nasdaq home to Cvent Holdings, On24, and Zoom Technologies reached its highest ever point at just over 16,000 points. In the first year of the pandemic, American venture capitalists made a record $130 billion worth of investments. If it was a boom time for a few event platforms, it was in an environment of supercharged assets. Virtual event platforms sparked innovation and investor interest in a world dealing with a pandemic where no one could meet physically. Over several months, hundreds of platforms either pivoted or entered the market. In March 2019, the problem
E
pandemic-driven jump to digital, the industry now faces something of a reckoning as life, and meetings and events, returns to something like ‘normal’. From the outbreak of Covid-19 in December 2019 to January 2021, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates that $13 trillion was injected into the global economy by governments. Much of that was via quantitative easing, which effectively allowed banks and companies to exchange assets (including bad ones) for cash. Never has the global economy seen so much ‘hot money’, and the destination in a world of low interest rates was shares and startups. In January 2018, the S&P 500, the index that tracks the performance of 500 of the largest listed
December 2020 Bizzabo raised $138m.
February 2021 On24 goes public with shares opening at above $60 per share.
SIGNIFICANT MOVES IN EVENT TECHNOLOGY AUGUST 2020 – MARCH 2022
2021
January 2021 Hopin acquires Streamyard for $250m.
In August 2020 a $450m funding round valued London-based startup Hopin at $7.75bn.
26 2022 #1 AMIMAGAZINE.GLOBAL
Made with FlippingBook Online newsletter maker