Established events businesses are attracting some very big buyers. A show that brings the right buyers and sellers together can be worth a fortune. On 6 October, UK-listed Informa agreed to pay £2.24bn for Clarion Events, whose exhibitions include IFA Berlin and the DSEI defence show. It also announced plans to separate Taylor & Francis, the academic publisher it has owned for more than two decades.
Informa’s B2B Live Events division generated £1.59bn in revenue in the first half of 2026, including £1.18bn from exhibitors and sponsors. Adjusted operating profit reached £449.5m, although its margin fell to 28.3% from 30.5% a year earlier.
What brings buyers into the room
For exhibitors, a trade show offers the chance to meet customers and partners they might otherwise struggle to reach. Organisers can charge for that access through exhibition stands and sponsorships.
In June, private equity firm Hellman & Friedman agreed to acquire UK events organiser Hyve, which reported 15% organic revenue growth in 2025. Hyve says it arranged more than 160,000 meetings across its events that year.
Publishers are buying events that serve their existing audiences, too. In October, Diversified UK & Europe acquired Smart Buildings Media, which runs an exhibition and two digital publications. From 2027, its show will run alongside Digital Construction Week and GEO Business in London.
Amanda Barnes is chief executive of specialist publisher Faversham House, which has organised events since the 1970s. They help the company meet readers, understand their concerns and gather audience data. Yet editorial success does not guarantee a profitable conference.
“An established editorial brand is extremely useful as the bedrock of a successful events business,” Barnes says. “However, you also need to employ the disciplines of a pure-play conference company too. Editors don’t always come up with the most commercially viable topics because they sometimes focus on areas which are not yet ripe for commercialisation. You need to validate an event concept and that’s not always the same as what readers are consuming.”
Barnes believes smaller publishers can compete with major organisers by using their reporting and research to give people a reason to attend. They still need to know what those people will pay for.
The cost of getting it wrong
Venue hire, staff and production costs can mount before a single ticket is sold. Sponsors may still be undecided when an organiser has to commit to a venue.
“The upfront costs of committing to a venue can be off putting,” Barnes says, “because you must secure and pay a deposit for a good venue in advance of knowing whether it will be a commercial success.”
She recommends reading terms and condition and trying to get a few sponsors sufficiently engaged and enthusiastic to sign contracts and cover your costs. Sponsors also have spending decisions to justify and want to know whether the meetings they pay for will lead to business.
In September, B2B marketing agency Outcomes Rocket surveyed 841 marketing, sales and business development professionals worldwide. Among those who had attended a conference in the previous year, 68.9% said they had reported event returns to management that they did not fully trust.
“If pipeline and revenue are not the metric, the conference is just a very expensive trip,” Outcomes Rocket’s CEO Saul Marquez said in a statement accompanying the research.
Organisers are using pre-arranged meetings, better lead tracking and more focused networking to help sponsors see what they are getting for their money. The billions flowing into events businesses suggest investors see considerable value in gathering specialist audiences.
For publishers hoping to follow, success depends on giving attendees, exhibitors and sponsors enough reason to come back year after year.
Established events businesses are attracting some very big buyers. A show that brings the right buyers and sellers together can be worth a fortune. On 6 October, UK-listed Informa agreed to pay £2.24bn for Clarion Events, whose exhibitions include IFA Berlin and the DSEI defence show. It also announced plans to separate Taylor & Francis, the academic publisher it has owned for more than two decades.
Informa's B2B Live Events division generated £1.59bn in revenue in the first half of 2026, including £1.18bn from exhibitors and sponsors. Adjusted operating profit reached £449.5m, although its margin fell to 28.3% from 30.5% a year earlier.
