NZ event app company ShowGizmo clocks its 500th app!

NZ event app company ShowGizmo clocks its 500th app!

Based in New Zealand’s capital Wellington, ShowGizmo passed a landmark by shipping its 500th event app this week for IBM Australia.

In just over three years ShowGizmo has mobilized events around the world, “on every continent except Antarctica,” jokes CEO Marie-Claire Andrews.

“Event apps are now an expected part of conferences, tradeshows, award ceremonies and the like. We’ve been riding the wave of increased smartphone penetration and app adoption. In addition to IBM, our client portfolio now includes iconic names such as Formula 1, Armageddon, CeBit and Deloitte.”

Early event apps were little more than digital event guides, which allowed event producers to save money by printing fewer programmes. Today they have blossomed into powerful engagement tools that encourage communities to form around events. According to industry commentators, event apps have been around since 2008 with roughly 25,000 apps created to date, an average rate of just over 4,100 apps a year globally.

“That sounds like a lot, but when you consider that over 1.8 million events take place in the US alone it’s a drop in the bucket, just 0.02% of events. And it shows how impressive ShowGizmo’s story is,” says Marie-Claire. ‘We’re the dominant event app in Australasia, thanks to just getting on a plane and going there!’

To achieve this, Marie-Claire and other members of ‘Team ShowGizmo’ have become frequent flyers, crossing the Tasman two or three times each month.
“We see huge potential in that market, as the events industry there is strengthening, smartphone penetration is the second highest in the world, and our offshore competitors just can’t support customers there in the way we can.”

The company’s growth strategy includes partnerships with other leading event suppliers, having been appointed as preferred supplier to the United Nations in 2013, they more recently partnered with Sky City Convention Centre in Auckland and etouches, TradEvent and IvVy in Australia.

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