WingateWeb Prepares for Next Phase
By Margo McCall -- Tradeshow Week, 3/13/2006
When MediaLive Intl. CEO Bob Priest-Heck acquired WingateWeb in 2004, his goal was to up the technological ante for his company's events without having to pay for in-house developers.
The Lindon, Utah-based provider of event management software came with its own technology-heavy roster of Fortune 500 corporate event clients. Thus, it could support itself while at the same time lending its housing, registration and conference management services to MediaLive events.
But with CMP Media's $65 million purchase of MediaLive's 20 technology events in January, WingateWeb is now all that's left of the producer of the legendary, but now-defunct, COMDEX.
The employees who joined CMP Media with the shows' acquisition are still working out of the MediaLive offices. Priest-Heck, meanwhile, is sticking around to map Wingate's future.
"Our intentions are to recapitalize the company and continue to run it, or sell it. We are looking at both of those options right now," he said.
WingateWeb co-founder Thomas Karren said he's excited about the prospect of a new owner. "There's a lot of interest in the organization at this point. It's definitely generated a buzz in the industry," he said.
The company's customizable event and conference platform provides housing, registration and session management features. It is approaching its fifth iteration. Future versions could tie the solution into freight companies and other service providers, said Karren, senior vice president and general manager.
In the past, event managers used in-house software to help serve their customers' needs. But as clients have become more sophisticated, such firms have increasingly left the job to companies like WingateWeb.
"The competitive landscape is changing. We used to compete with agencies and event managers. But those organizations have gotten to a point where they want to focus on the business they do best," he said.
Karren said that's why it makes sense to set up a channel program to resell WingateWeb's services on a broader level. He would also like to see industry standards adopted. As a sign of the changing market, Wingate recently signed a marketing partnership with nTag Interactive, an event data management firm.
MediaLive, backed by Thomas Weisel Partners, had put the technology shows and the software company up for sale separately. CMP Media will continue to use WingateWeb to service the acquired MediaLive shows, which include INTEROP and VoiceCon. And CMP Media parent United Business Media is among the entities expressing an interest in WingateWeb.
"We have started to look at potential acquirers. There's a nice list of folks that are interesting," Priest-Heck said.
Although corporate event customers like Hewlett-Packard and General Electric are the 50-employee WingateWeb's bread and butter, Priest-Heck said the company's getting some interest from associations and for-profit tradeshow producers.
He said WingateWeb's tools enable event producers to tailor one-to-many messages. "With the technological tools in place, you can deliver a contextualized message to every attendee at the show. It becomes a one-to-one message, compared to a one-to-many message," he said.
