BRIC nations blocked growth, says MCI boss

WORLD – The economic slowdown in emerging national economies has hurt the performance of global event organisers. Sebastien Tondeur, CEO at MCI Global, said that instability in the Middle East has also impacted negatively on the international events industry. MCI is headquartered in Geneva with offices around the world. According to its latest financial results, EBITDA fell from €15,693,000 to €11,100,000 in 2014 and net profit fell from €5,402,000 to €790,000. The firm posted a best-ever gross margin of €122 million representing a 5% increase from 2013. Tondeur told CN: “We have been impacted by a lack of anticipation on the slow down in economies that have traditionally been pulling global growth – the so-called BRIC nations. A similar effect could be observed with some client perception of the Middle East region stability. “In the past three years, currency fluctuations have become more of a challenge. This is out of our control, but a number of central banks have influenced ‘very last minute’ some global currency parities and we were materially impacted.” Tondeur said MCI is “very excited” about its new companies in the USA. He said: “We have been investing heavily in this market following our clients request. As a growth company, our focus in revenue and we are happy to report that our industry is still growing compared to other sectors.” MCI operated double the traditional volume of events in January 2015 compared to the previous two years January. According to Tondeur, this reflects a requirement of some customers to optimise their own results as oil prices, and other external factors, impacted businesses. But it is also a proof that our industry is strong and events are core to their business model. He said: “We believe 2015 will be a year where we can show that the investment from 2014 pay off both for our financials and the value we deliver to our customers.”