Simworx team celebrates multiple award wins at IAAPA Expo alongside another successful European exposition.
Fresh back from Vienna, the Simworx Sales team remains on a high after a successful week at the IAAPA Expo Europe, this year in the in the capital of Austria. Reflecting on their busiest European show since the pandemic, the exposition saw an array of industry professionals come together to showcase their latest innovations at the Messe Wien Exhibition & Congress Centre on the largest trade show floor in the history of the region offering.
Kicking off the week, Simworx attended the Kirmes & Park Revue European Star Awards on the Monday night. Honouring the best theme parks, most noteworthy attractions and spectacular coasters, the event this year took place in the heart of Wien Prater – Vienna’s oldest Theme Park. Simworx was awarded, once again, a Star Award in the Best Dark Ride category, having won it for the attraction many times over the years. The award this year for their Ghost Train attraction which was recently renovated from its former self ‘Derren Brown’s Ghost Train’. Featured at Thorpe Park, the Ghost Train opened in 2016 as a Virtual Reality Advanced Dark Ride themed around the London underground however has since been reimagined with the VR integration being replaced to encompass live actors instead.
Simworx, this year situated at Booth #A2209 in the exhibition hall accommodated a range of visitors at their booth with enquiries from faces, new and familiar. Promoting their Metro Mover attraction and ‘Zombie Metro Mover’ concept alongside it they drummed up interest for the various ways that the attraction can be imagined through immersive storylines.
With a focus on the scalability of their attractions, Simworx also pushed their Pegasus Flying Theatre system as they look forward to the opening of the first example of the new Flying attraction solution in Europe, due towards the end of the year. They showcased its unique abilities, customisability and versatile storytelling opportunities all packaged in the scalable and affordable product.
To further their message of Scalability, the Simworx creative team duo, Nicole Sangster and Matt Clarkson hosted a talk titled One Ride Fits All: The Scalability of Attractions on the Innovation stage on the Tuesday afternoon where they discussed the creative thinking and tactics that they employ when scaling attractions for various venues and customer requirements. The talk was very well received, with many commenting on how they enjoyed understanding the theory to a practise commonly used across the industry.
Celebrating the beginning of the Expo, this year’s Opening reception was hosted at Schweizerhaus – a historical restaurant at Prater Wien, conveniently situated just by the Exhibition Hall. Show attendees descended upon the amusement park, after a successful first day, for an evening of entertainment, food and drinks as they took the opportunity to network and catch up with industry friends.
On the Wednesday evening, the team attended the annual Park World Award ceremony held at The Palais Berg. The event honours the EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa) attraction industry’s premier talent and recognises exceptional operators, suppliers, manufacturers and entertainment specialists from across the continent. Enjoying a star-studded night of awards presentations to a plethora of worthy attractions and parks, it was topped off by an award win in the Marketing initiative category for Simworx’s AGV Dark Ride / Overdrive campaign. The campaign centred around increasing product awareness for the AGV Dark ride at last year’s Expo, in the run-up to it, as well as the development of the story concept – Overdrive – in partnership with Katapult.
Rounding up their time at the Expo, Simworx concluded their Thursday with an action-packed day rounding up their final enquiries and learning from the Education sessions; along with also supporting the Next Gen Showcase as Patron sponsors of the young-professional aimed educational program aimed to accelerate the careers of aspiring themed entertainment professionals. The team headed home after many successful meetings to support existing clients and build new trusted partnerships with prospective customers.
This year’s IAAPA Expo Europe was attended by over 12,000 leisure, tourism and entertainment professionals worldwide, with 633 exhibiting companies taking over the 17,670 square meters of show floor. The team are already looking forward to next year’s European IAAPA Expo in Amsterdam.
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