LinuxWorld Expands

Staff -- Tradeshow Week, 1/10/2005

IDG World Expo's LinuxWorld Conference & Expo brand is spreading to Mexico and Russia, bringing to 13 the number of countries where the event is held.

Under a licensing agreement, E.J. Krause & Associates will manage the brand in Mexico. E.J. Krause will hold a conference called LinuxWorld Mexico Summit June 9–10, and collocate LinuxWorld Conference & Expo with EXPO COMM MEXICO in February 2006 at Mexico City's Centro Banamex Exhibition & Convention Center.

Reed Exhibitions will launch LinuxWorld Russia Sept. 7–9 at Moscow's Gostiny Dvor under a licensing agreement with IDG. Russian organizer Restec Exhibition will work with Reed to launch the event, which will be collocated with Reed's Infosecurity Moscow and Storage Expo Russia.

Besides Mexico and Russia, IDG's open-source event is held in Canada, China, Germany, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Singapore, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The LinuxWorld brand got its start in 1999 in the United States, where 50,000 net square foot events are now held in San Francisco and Boston. Each of the international agreements is different. Some are joint ventures and some are licensing agreements. IDG World Expo typically uses in-country producers to leverage their knowledge of local markets, rather than producing international shows from the company's Framingham, Mass., headquarters.