PlanetIMEX unveils online islands and readies for lift-off with EduMonday

New online experience, PlanetIMEX has officially launched with the unveiling of the first two online ‘islands’ of content and experiences, and the first part of the meetings milky way coming into focus with EduMonday on 11 May. Education Island and Community Island are promised to be rich, engaging 3-D online experiences and will be complemented by a third, Networking Island, due to launch 14 May. The whole digital event kicks off with EduMonday Live on 11 May. There is a range of curated education sessions led by 40 expert speakers and meetings events professionals are invited to register free of charge here. The education platform is supported by partners Cvent and Streamlined Communications and each session is also complemented by the CrowdCompass mobile event app which offers an opportunity to interact with speakers and other attendees. For those unable to attend EduMonday, which starts at 10am UK time, IMEX is promising to make all recordings available in an online library later in the month. Guy Bigwood, Managing Director of the Global Destination Sustainability Index, will deliver the keynote, entitled ‘The big pivot – Towards a regenerative events industry’. Among the other speakers are Glenn Schoen CEO, Boardroom@Crisis BV; Jonny Round, Managing Director, The Sound Agency; Horst Bayer, Sustainable Travel Consultant and freelancer creative consultant and industry expert Robert Dunsmore. Focusing on business recovery and longer-term strategies are consultant and business change expert, Michael Greenspan and, Global Futurist, Rohit Talwar. EduMonday Live has been crafted around a series of 20-minute sessions with a few longer workshops offering a deeper dive. Sessions will address hot topics including resilience, the future of work, creative event design for a new era, crisis communication, contract negotiations, technology, wellbeing and psychology. EduMonday will wrap up with a choice of four light-hearted ‘Social Soirees’ at 4.30pm. She Means Business Also taking place on EduMonday Live is She Means Business, a live panel discussion where women in the business events industry will share some of the toughest decisions they’ve had to make due to the Covid-19 pandemic and recent lockdown. Island hopping with a purpose – Community Day On 12 May PlanetIMEX will host a dedicated Community Day when a dozen industry partners and associations will offer a combination of live learning and recorded sessions, including panels, webinars, videos and forums. While all education and professional development will take place via Education Island, Community Island is the hub for light-hearted social activities as well as news and updates from IMEX’s global events industry partners and the wider community. These handpicked stories all come to life on the Island’s pop-up Community Notice Board. Carina Bauer, CEO of the IMEX Group, explains, “I’d like to say today has been a long time coming but we’ve managed to pull off this exceptional project in just six weeks! We’re delighted to be giving back to the industry with this carefully designed online experience intended to give everyone, and all sectors, something of value, be that business introductions, new insights and learnings or simply the chance to socialise with each other in a fresh new way. This is just the start. There’s plenty more planned and we’re still evolving this concept and learning as we go. We can’t wait for people to sign up for EduMonday Live and also to dive in and explore PlanetIMEX.”