There were more than 25,000 participants from 74 countries; however the most immediately noticeable new factor at this year's MIPIM was a huge presence of participants from the East, especially Russia.
The Palais de Festival in and around which the exhibition is held was plastered with banners promoting various regions of Russia. The Region of Krasnodar sponsored the opening cocktail parties (there were two this year in different hotels at the same time) and had a huge stand in their own pavilion on the promenade front. Kazan did similar with a stand featuring lots of long legged blondes. There was even a Russian VIP lounge.
Despite there being no official Kyiv or Ukraine stands, this year Ukraine put on a strong showing with exhibitors taking twice as much space at MIPIM than last year. From our own experiences and the talks we held with other Ukrainian exhibitors we saw a massive amount of interest this year in the Ukrainian commercial property market across all sectors - retail, commercial, logistics, hotel and residential.
Another remarkable feature is that this interest is no longer only Kyiv focused. If this interest follows through we can expect a substantial increase in the amount of FDI into the Ukrainian property market this year.
However this strong eastern presence could have a downside, some expressed. There is speculation that MIPIM is to be split into two events next year with a special exhibition for the emerging markets. The majority of the market veterans we spoke with did not see this as a positive move as there are plenty of specialised exhibitions and conferences already. MIPIM is the big event that "everyone" goes to once a year hence its enduring popularity. An emerging markets-only exhibition would probably not have the same drawing power.
One possible reason for this proposed split is that success has a cost and the cost for MIPIM is probably now too great for Cannes. Participants are forced to stay further and further from the exhibition due to a lack of hotel rooms and getting back to those distant rooms after the evening’s many social events can almost be Mission Impossible due to inadequate taxi or bus services. One client of ours spent the night on the floor of Nice airport - his hotel told him it would be impossible to book an early morning taxi.
