CeBIT opens its doors

Technology pundits descended upon Darling Harbour in Sydney to attend the CeBIT trade show, which officially opened its doors today.

First day hiccups aside, first time exhibitors were excited to be at the show and those who had been at CeBIT before were happy to be back.

Peter Kolomyjec, business development manager of Straightsell said its website content management and ecommerce software platform was being launched at CeBIT.

“This is the first time we have attended the event, we thought we would have a go. We’ve been to other trade shows, but nothing this big, we are very excited. Before the doors even opened at 10am I had enquiries about Straightsell,” said Kolomyjec.

“I think it’s not only useful to get in touch with customers and potential partners, but also each of the stands are looking what the other is doing and seeing if it can be applied to their organisation.”

Cabac, a division of the Cable Accessories Group Holdings was there for the second time.

Chitrang Trivedi, account manager, computer dealer market at CABAC said the component and electronic distributor were targeting resellers and wholesalers at the show.

“Around 70 percent of enquiries we get from the show we have to qualify as a partner. It should take us 15 to 20 days to sort out the people we scan in at our stand. Then it takes two and a half-three months before they become a qualified partner,” said Trivedi.

“CeBIT is important to us because it covers the electrical market.”

Scott Atkinson, director infrastructure solutions at NetForce, a Powertel channel partner agreed. The networking and managed services company said the show gave Netforce an interface to their customer base.

“It takes us 20 seconds to tell who the students are and who we want to sell to. CeBit gives us an opportunity to talk one on one with our customers,” he said.

Microsoft was a no-show this year while Telstra, Adobe, NEC, Unisys, Intel, IBM, Symbol, HP and Blackberry exhibited for the first time.

Haymarket Media, publisher of CRN was one of 700 companies exhibiting at the show. There were 600 exhibitors last year.

Around 18,000 people had pre-registered to attend and Hannover was expecting 30,000 to walk through the door.