As the island’s largest purpose-built facility, the Taipei World Trade Center (TWTC) Nangang Exhibition Hall is the venue of choice for big local and international exhibitions hosted in Taiwan.
More than three years after the seven-storey complex was opened in March 2008, the two exhibition areas have been spruced up in multiple ways for corporate events and conferences, which are typically not its bread and butter.
“We have become a popular location for holding different kinds of mega-size events – hosting gala dinners for big incentive groups, concerts, sports games, religious services, direct sales conferences and fashion shows,” says Yih-Jyh Kang, executive director of the TWTC Nangang Exhibition Hall.
Some of these events include: the 2009 Asia-Pacific Herbalife University for 12,000 delegates from 12 countries, claimed to be the largest event over the last decade; the 2010 Bayer Healthcare China Conference for 3,000, the first to be held in Taiwan; the gala dinner for the 2010 Perfect China Conference for 5,200, where the arrival of 130 tour buses was perfectly synchronised to avoid any gridlock and get every guest in on time; and the NU Skin Dr Kenichi Ohmae Forum for 17,200, where a 360-degree stage was built in the centre of the room to give each attendee an unobstructed view of the speaker.
Kang attributes this to the flexibility of the space, particularly of the column-free exhibition area on the fourth floor, which can be divided into three so that event organisers have the option to use only a part of the available space.
“We have already held seven corporate year-end parties in the first half of this year. The largest among them was organised by a financial holding company with 1,400 tables and 14,000 people. This was the first time we had held such a large-scale corporate party and it was a dazzling success,” Kang says.
Its popularity as an events venue went up several notches with the opening last February of the MRT Nangang Line Eastern Extension, shortening the travel time between the venue and downtown Taipei to 20 minutes. Previously, passengers had to disembark at the Nangang Station and take the shuttle bus to the Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center Station. Now, two MRT metro lines have direct connections to the facility via underground stations.
Meanwhile, the venue is set to almost double in capacity as the TWTC Nangang Exhibition Hall 2, which is being constructed at a cost of NT$6.3 billion (US$218.6 million), nears completion in 2012. When done, the expanded facility will have a total area of around 85,000sqm.
It appears that TWTC Nangang Exhibition Hall is living up to its mega-size promise.
Key Facts
CAPACITY
TOTAL FLOOR AREA: 144,000sqm
SITE AREA: six hectares
EXHIBITION SPACE: 45,360sqm over two storeys, one on the ground level and the other on the fourth floor
CONFERENCE SPACE: 12 meeting rooms on the fourth and fifth floors with a total combined area of 1,891sqm
OTHER FACILITIES: There is a 1,000sqm outdoor exhibition area, four VIP rooms, a VIP briefing room, a press centre and a bonded warehouse. There are fast-food restaurants, a café, convenience store, flower shop and convenience store on the first floor. The third floor houses a couple of restaurants specialising in Chinese and Western cuisine – one can seat up to 450 people while the other can cater for up to 400 people respectively – and a cafeteria for less formal dining, with a capacity for 250 people
CONTACT
TWTC Nangang Exhibition Hall
No. 1, Jingmao 2nd Road, Nangang District, Taipei 11568, Taiwan
Tel: +886 2 2725 5200
(Ext 5525/5526)
Email: niec@taitra.org.tw
Website: www.twtcnangang.com.tw
