President Min Min-hong of the Incheon Tourism Organization (ITO) poses after he received a plaque of recognizing social contributions to the local communities via tourism project from the Ministry of Health and Welfare and SSN in 2020. ITO has been credited with conducting social contribution activities designed to solve problems of the regional society. (Photos: ITO)

The Incheon Tourism Organization (ITO) has issued requests for proposals (RFPs) and bids for exhibitors of Songdo Conventia’s exhibition halls during the period between Jan. 6, 2022 and Feb.2.
Up for grabs are four exhibition halls of the convention center in Incheon.

The scope of the solicitation covers exhibitions, events and corporate activities, to be held during the year 2022, but new events other than the previous pregnancy, childbirth and daycare exhibitions will be excluded.

Songdo Conventia, Incheon’s representative exhibition center, boasts optimal exhibition space - four exhibition halls for large-sized exhibitions, two ballrooms, each capable of accommodating a maximum of 3,000 people, and 35 conference rooms of diverse types.

Songdo Conventia has been building smart MICE (meetings, incentive travels, conventions and exhibitions) for the past four years, embracing the exhibition industry and technologies.

All things being handled at Songdo Conventia are integrated and automated by converging MICE and IT, and a smart disinfection system is in place with a regime designed to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Kim Ji-ahn, head of ITO’s exhibition marketing team,said, “Exhibitions will be essential tools to create businesses even in the post-COVID-19 pandemic era.”

ITO will spare no efforts to contribute to the development of the regional economy by accommodating exhibitors earlier through the regular RFPs and bids for the exhibition space of the convention center, Kim added.

Incheon, ITO Sign MOU on ‘Smart Tourism City Pilot Project’

The Incehon metropolitan government and ITO struck an MOU on the successful implementation of a pilot project to build a smart tourism city with a consortium on Dec. 22.

Among the 13 signatories of the agreement, selected in a public contest, were Mirae Asset Daewoo, SK Telecom, Tencent Korea, Like-A-Local, Movv, and Imform.

The project calls for offering convenient, differentiation tourism services by embracing smart technologies into the tourism industry. Incheon was designated as the nation’s first city beneficiary of a pilot project to build a smart tourism city last Sept. 22.

Under the project, an integrated mobile platform targeting the “open port area” of Incheon is being built for opening scheduled for upcoming April.

The consortium will build five tourism components: smart experiences (AR/VR experiences), smart mobility, smart convenience services for bookings and settlements, smart services (AI-recommended services) and smart platform for tourism big data.

Mirae Asset Daewoo will be in charge of developing the I-PASS System, an appointment and booking system of the integrated mobile platform, and recruiting and operating franchise outlets.

Like-A-Local will be responsible for making AI-oriented tourism destination recommendations tailored to meet foreign and Korean tourists’ tastes, as well as producing tourism content.