Facts & Figures

In the 2020 financial year, it thus only proved possible to stage four of the planned 24 MCH exhibitions: Swissbau and SWISS-MOTO with SWISS-CUSTOM in January and February, and ILMAC Lausanne in October. All the other exhibitions in Switzerland – including Baselworld, Art Basel in Basel and Giardina Zürich – had to be cancelled, as did Art Basel in Hong Kong and Miami Beach and Masterpiece London. Taking the figures for the last time the exhibitions were staged, some 4000 exhibiting companies will have been affected by the cancellation of the 20 fairs.

As part of Fine Art Asia 2020 in Hong Kong, "Hong Kong Spotlights by Art Basel" was held in November 2020, where 22 galleries in the Hong Kong art scene offered opportunities to experience art in person.

At the time of the cancelled Art Basel in Hong Kong, Art Basel was able to offer its Online Viewing Rooms (OVR) for the first time in March 2020. Galleries that had registered for the cancelled shows were able to participate in OVRs which were also staged at the time of the cancelled fairs in Basel (June 2020) and Miami Beach (December 2020). In autumn 2020, Art Basel additionally offered two theme-specific OVRs for works created in 2020 (OVR 2020) and 20th century works (OVR 20c).

In November 2020, Swissbau held its first online live event and launched a digital extension to the Swissbau Innovation Lab that had been set up in 2018. It has now created a new community platform that is active all year round.

At the MCH Group’s own locations in Basel and Zurich, it only proved possible to stage eight of the 39 exhibitions planned for the 2020 financial year – three of the MCH exhibitions and five of the 24 third-party exhibitions.

At Messe Basel, Swissbau was the only one of seven scheduled MCH exhibitions that could be held. Details of the MCH exhibitions are included above. Of the nine third-party exhibitions that had been planned, only blickfang, which had been postponed to October, was able to take place. All other third-party exhibitions had to be cancelled, including AUTO/MOBIL Basel, FANTASY Basel and the Basel career and training fair. In the case of hall rentals too, most events had to be cancelled. Areas of Hall 2 were made available to the Basel theatre for rehearsals for just under three months. The go-cart track in Hall 1 – the biggest indoor go-cart track in Switzerland – had to cease operating after a few weeks on account of the Covid-19 protection measures introduced.

At the Congress Center Basel too, the number of events – and particularly big congresses with accompanying exhibitions – lagged clearly behind the figure for the previous year, even though a large number of conferences were held in hybrid or virtual form. The Congress Center Basel additionally hosted sessions of the Basel-Stadt and Basel-Landschaft cantonal parliaments, which will also be the case until further notice in 2021. In December 2020, the city of Basel set up its vaccination centre in Hall 4U.

Of the eight MCH exhibitions that had been planned at Messe Zurich, only SWISS-MOTO and SWISS-CUSTOM could be staged. Details of the MCH exhibitions are included above. Of the 15 third-party exhibitions that had been scheduled, it was only possible to hold four. All the others had to be cancelled, including the Auto Car Show Zürich, Bauen&Modernisieren and the Zurich Game Show. Messe Zurich hosted parliamentary sessions for the parliaments of the Canton and City of Zurich, which it will also do in 2021. It also hosts one of the eleven Covid-19 vaccination centers in the canton of Zurich.

In the Live Marketing Solutions (LMS) division, a total of 1,124 projects were supervised in the reporting year, 130 of which were in Switzerland and 826 in the USA. In terms of numbers, this is about 30 % of the projects handled the previous year.

In the LMS segment, the first quarter was strongly impacted by the cancellation or postponement of numerous events in Europe and Asia. China was able to stage a number of major exhibitions in the autumn again, but with a drastically reduced number of participants. In the second quarter, the United States was also hit by the pandemic, causing the majority of events there to be cancelled or postponed too.

Major cancellations for the LMS division included the large-scale MCH Art Basel and Baselworld shows and numerous motor shows. A prominent example of the major events that had to be postponed is the Expo Dubai 2020, where the LMS division has been commissioned to build several pavilions.

Due to the time lag in the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic, it was still possible to finish a number of projects for Swissbau in Basel, Bauma in Shanghai and CES in Las Vegas at the start of 2020 and for the Beijing Motor Show in autumn 2020.

In addition a number of virtual events were handled – for expample:  For Porsche ME & Africa, MCH Global was selected to deliver a three-day virtual conference involving more than 20 countries. MCH Global created the art direction, programmed the online platform, edited brand content and also set up a full studio at Porsche Training Center. With more than 25 hours of live streaming up to 300 online viewers were engaged, incorporating international guests, live polling, breakout rooms, Q&A sessions and on demand viewing.

The LMS division was similarly able to complete various projects fitting out interiors, for example LMS Switzerland (Expomobilia) the “Lindt Home of Chocolate”. Expomobilia also promptly switched to producing “corona protection products” and set up an online shop, where the more than 30 articles – from counter protection installations to people counting systems and disinfection steles – can be ordered.