During the Conferences of the Academic Programming, the issue of informality among the people who manage the sound installations in the companies and the possible deception in some characteristics of the audio products came to the surface.
By Richard Santa S.
After a 300% increase in the companies participating in the Commercial Exhibition compared to last year and with 1,500 attendees, the alliance between TecnoMultimedia and InfoComm was a success. The satisfaction report was given by the organizers of the Congress.
Max Jaramillo, president of the magazine publishing house and event organizer Latin Press, stressed that "the alliance allowed the Congress to have greater seriousness and maturity, being a winner for us, for InfoComm and for the audiovisual industry."
For his part, Rodrigo Casassus, regional director for Latin America of InfoComm, said that "the balance is extremely positive, the exhibitors have been very impressed with the quality and quantity of the public, which shows the interest in the market towards this type of show".
That same feeling was shared by the exhibitors of the TecnoMultimedia Commercial Exhibition, who were pleased by the number of specialized attendees with whom they could interact during the two days of the show.
For Alexander Gaitán, from AMG Virtual, the Congress met the expectations that his company had. "This is our first participation in TecnoMultimedia InfoComm and we are leaving with quite a few business projects, we were able to share and exchange information with many people."
The Marketing Coordinator of Automa, Pilar Trujillo, also said that during the Congress she managed to share with many people from the audiovisual industry, who passed through her stand.
Jose Antonio Hernández, general director of Techno Shine, said that this was the first time they participated in the Commercial Exhibition and that it was much better than they initially expected.
Of international stature
And it is that the Congress that was held in Medellín last November exceeded all the expectations that it had generated in the audiovisual industry, not only in Colombia, but also in the other countries of Latin America.
This was confirmed by Guillermo Rueda, technical manager of Yamaki, who said that in the week before the Congress he was at a Latin American convention with people from the industry in Chile and that everyone knew about it and commented on the expectation generated by TecnoMultimedia after its alliance with InfoComm.
He added that he was pleasantly surprised because during the two days of the Trade Show he was able to share with many people from the industry, not only from Colombia, which was what he expected, but also from neighboring countries such as Panama and Ecuador.
"The call made by the fair was very good. I think it is good that the big and recognized brands have come with large stands and physical samples of their main products, because that gives strength to the fair and the final will be profitable for the industry. "
Opening markets
TecnoMultimedia InfoComm also served as a thermometer for the audiovisual industry in the region to help make internationalization decisions. This is the case of Techno Shine, a Mexican company that for the first time is looking for markets outside its country.
Its director, José Antonio Hernández, indicated that they decided to come to Colombia after having participated in the first version of the Congress in Mexico, which was held in August, seeking to materialize the idea he had in his head a few months ago.
"In this Expo we have done so well, that we are going to open our first office outside of Mexico in January and the headquarters will be Colombia. We have found that this is a market that is ready to receive the products we offer."
He added that the good results of Techno Shine's participation in TecnoMultimedia InfoComm, both in its Mexico chapter and in Colombia, were more than enough for the company Christie Digital to support them to be their authorized distributors in Colombia with their new headquarters.
Analyzing the industry
The quality of the Academic Programming was guaranteed by the outstanding speakers of InfoComm, who opened interesting spaces for discussion on current issues in the audiovisual industry.
During one of the conferences by Juan Fernando Montoya, sales manager Centro & South America Communications Division of Bosch, they talked about the half-truths that some of the sound products bring in their characteristics, ending in unfair competition and deception for the end user.
Juan Fernando Montoya explained that half-truths occur when the labels ensure that the equipment is of a greater capacity, but do not specify under what conditions the measurement was made, so, when using the equipment the result is lower than expected.
For his part, Guillermo Rueda said that this phenomenon occurs all the time, especially in the teams that come from Asian countries and that are of economic line.
He assured that "Paper holds everything, that's why some companies disguise the information and there are others that do lie blatantly. Colombia, for example, is the champion country of its own brands, each city has one. Most are made in China and do not have the real characteristics of the product."
Another aspect addressed is the informality between those who manage sound systems in companies, which in many cases are people without the necessary knowledge and that is why the equipment ends up being underused and in the worst case even damaged.
In this regard, Alexander Gaitán said that it is true that there is a lot of empirical handling sound installations and that is why companies in the industry offer training courses among their clients, although he recognizes that there are many empirical who know a lot about the subject without having studied.
Guillermo Rueda said that "today we are less bad than ten years ago in this sense, because there are already more institutions teaching careers related to the industry, but what is missing is that those people learn what we really need, many of the engineers do not know the reality they face."
At the close of TecnoMultimedia InfoComm Colombia, Sebastián Fernández, Vice President of Operations of LatinPress, indicated that there will be an increase in the space for the Commercial Exhibition and 90% of this year's exhibitors confirmed their presence in the 2012 version.
