| Friday, 15 January 2016 09:56 |
Cartes is moving to Cannes
And reinventing itself in the process 
Cartes, the payments and security industry event that has been having a name crisis for years is moving venue, and completing the change of name to TrusTech.
Once the absolutely essential industry event for anyone involved in payments and systems technology in Europe and to some extent the whole world, Cartes has had a tough time in recent years.
Since its move out of central Paris to an exibition centre one stop from Charles de Gaulle airport, visitors and exhbitors have constantly moaned about the long journey times to central Paris for those who want to do more than sleep in the evenings. This is exacerbated by the difficulty of entertaining clients when some will choose to stay near the venue and others are spread out across the city, a long and difficult commute away. Then there is the weather. Cartes is held in November/December so snow can render the roads difficult and the trains slow. I have spent literally hours trying to get both to the event and away from it.
Added to these difficulties, there are the strikes. I can think of three separate occasions when public transport has been cancelled, making the journey arduous to say the least, even though the organisers did their best with a fleet of coaches. The access motorway fouls up very easily. Walking across Paris dragging a heavy suitcase became an annual occurrence.
This year there was the additional and even more troubling problem of terrorist attacks. The massacre which included the Bataclan theatre with the death toll reaching 130 people, happened on the Saturday before Cartes, which significantly impacted the number of visitors. The number of empty stands showed that even companies which had invested in the show chose to stay away.
Then there is the identity issue. Who is Cartes - now Trustech - actually for? This has always been an interesting question. For years, delegates and exhibitors would both discuss how this was an event where the industry seems to be selling to the industry. Very few bankers and end users attended. This led to the focus moving from payments (card payments in the old days, hence the name) to technology for network security, payments security, authentication and all those other technology side areas. The card manufacturing and production people still exhibited, but the message was getting a little woolly. This confusion was reflected in the conference programme too.
In an email sent out yesterday, Cartes announces that "you spoke and we listened". Following a very wide industry information seeking exercise - which even included us journalists - Cartes has decided that what is broken needs fixing.
So a big hooray for the change of venue. Cannes, even in November will be lovely.
And the business case? Cartes/TrusTech says it is about secure payments, identification and connection, so that is clearer. Plus it will have a selection of startups and Fintech companies displaying their offerings which will be very useful, especially for banks who are now realising they have to buy into the new technologies and evolving ways of doing business.
Cannes is used to big events, and it has the infrastructure to deal with the big numbers. At the same time it is reasonably small and compact, so firms can put on their social and networking events in hotels and restaurants around the venue, and even use boats moored in the harbour.
So Cartes' big change gets the thumbs up from Card & Payments World, not least because the Palais des Festivals has one of the nicest press rooms in the world, with views over the boats and that wonderful sea. See you there on November 29th to December 1st. I might even get there early.
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