EVENT CANCELED!

Canceled due to continuing C19 complications – decision made June 14, 2021

When we started work on the Hannover project back in late February, we truly believed that the concept of a mainly outdoor event with live demos was entirely possible. A huge amount of work has gone into putting on this event and we certainly had every reasonable expectation that we could do something that would provide a valuable connection between our automotive and autonomous communities and exhibitors and their technology suppliers past, present and future.

While accepting that Covid-19 has been a horrid illness that has caused the deaths of so many people, we did not factor in three things: political point-scoring, ongoing media hype and a complete unwillingness by the authorities to take into account changing circumstances. The infection rate in Germany has now dropped to very low and we were given the green light two weeks ago to proceed with the event. Then last week we saw more news headlines about the new Indian variant and we had some exhibitors pull out due to the general air of uncertainty. Adding to the situation, I was refused entry into Germany despite putting in a special request to the relevant authorities. My head of event logistics and operations, Annika Gleichmann – a German national – was informed that she would be required to quarantine for 14 days on arrival and 10 further days when re-entering the UK. Yet we both come from parts of England where the Covid-19 rate is classified as too low to calculate/not applicable.

With great regret – and not just for our own travel reasons – we have had to cancel the event. I think if we had pushed on with it and it hadn’t been a great success, it would have been entirely unacceptable for our exhibitors to be told, “Actually, there is nobody here from the organizing company”. The same would have applied to our visitors.

I’m sure we all look forward to renewed success for everyone in Europe in the near future, when we will once again come together and put on a fantastic display of technologies for the automotive test and development community.

With best regards and apologies for not pulling the Hannover event through.

Tony Robinson
CEO, UKi Media & Events Ltd