Elisabeth Murdoch, BSkyB’s managing director, Anita Roddick, the
Body Shop founder, and Jamie Shea, Nato’s chief spokesman during the
Kosovo crisis, are among speakers lined up for next year’s world
advertising congress in London.
They are being joined by Martin Sorrell, WPP’s chief executive, Marjorie
Scardino, chief executive of the Pearson media conglomerate, and
Nicholas Negroponte, one of the world’s leading authorities on the
digital revolution.
All are among a group of key figures who will address the three-day
International Advertising Association’s conference next June under the
theme ’the new power of communication’. The conference is being billed
as the second largest business event taking place in the UK during
millennium year.
With up to 75 per cent of the pounds 1.3 million sponsorship money
needed to stage the congress already in place, the conference organisers
are already predicting that demand for the 2,500 delegate places will
outstrip supply.
Delegates will be able to set their own agendas for the congress, which
will offer up to 60 seminars and workshops covering its four themes -
creativity, culture, technology and ethics.
David Abraham, the chief operating officer of St Luke’s who is chairing
the organising committee, said: ’We want this to be the congress that
people will talk about in five years’ time.’
The agenda will embrace a an array of topics from creativity in the
emerging markets of Asia, the Middle East and Africa to winning over an
increasingly powerful gay market.
Among the most unusual offerings will be a presentation by the concert
violinist, Miha Pogacnik, who uses a symphony orchestra to demonstrate
the relationship between business and music.
’This won’t just be a conference but a debate about the future of the
industry,’ Abraham said.
