The Rotterdam Experiment: The Future of Events 2030 - The Rotterdam Way

The world is in a rapid transformation that crosses cultures, industries and localities. In the midst of everything that is going on, the events industry is looking for ways to meet the demands of a future still open for definition. What does the future hold? What are the new technologies and methods of collaborations that are needed? How can we learn to thrive? Besides these questions, it's clear that for the foreseeable future we won’t be able to travel or come together in the traditional way. Hybrid and online events are expected to become more and more the standard.

Rotterdam is the capital of innovation; resilience is in our DNA. When conditions are challenging, we excel. And these challenging times call for future focused solutions. Under the guidance of Rotterdam’s own futurist, best-selling author Mr Yuri van Geest, we will engage you during a dynamic series of collaborative experiments to explore the future of the events-industry.

“We are entering a new world: from control to trust, from scarcity to abundance, from separation to unity and from short term to long term. In our hearts we are connected to ourselves, each other, nature and the universe. We allow necessary imagination for the transformation of the system that is now revealing itself. For the event industry this means, among other things, space for co-creation, longer content-driven sessions, deep, personal and professional stories, retreats and new forms of being together.”
– Yuri van Geest

Learning and sharing

Like any good experiment, we will collect real-time data and exchange knowledge with each other. Experts from the events industry & beyond will provide an interdisciplinary perspective of our findings, and together we will build up the cumulative knowledge needed to give shape the event of the future. Knowledge and insights gained through The Rotterdam Experiment will be shared on this page!

Future events

2020 and 2021 (so far) have brought unexpected challenges for all of us. Rotterdam wouldn’t be Rotterdam, the capital of innovation with resilience strongly embedded it its DNA, if we didn’t take a challenge as basis to try and come up with creative solutions. Together with partners in our city and with MICE industry experts we  created two great events as part of the Rotterdam Experiment series. Later this year, around mid or end of September, the third Rotterdam Experiment will take place. We will keep you posted on the exact date as well as the program via this webpage.

We are still in challenging times. But exciting things are happening in Rotterdam. Coming and working together we can achieve great things. Rotterdam is hosting the biggest show in Europe this May; the Eurovision Song Contest. Despite all travel restrictions we are creating a campaign connecting the world to Eurovision and Rotterdam. We are co-creating this together with many of our partners and innovative companies in and around our city. Rotterdam is also hosting a special MICE edition of the International Advisory Board Rotterdam (IAB). International experts from the events industry and other sectors will come together virtually mid-April 2021 to advise Rotterdam on the future of the MICE industry. The IAB MICE will provide the City Council of Rotterdam with economic perspectives for the MICE sector worldwide and with information on the specific impact for the city of Rotterdam.

Two large scale and exciting events that will provide us with valuable insights and learnings, that we will be sharing with you.

We are expecting to organise a third edition of The Rotterdam Experiment after the summer, around mid or end of September.  We will keep you posted on the exact date as well as the program via this webpage.

Join The Rotterdam Experiment!

You too can be part of The Rotterdam Experiment! Contact us at conventions@rotterdampartners.nl. We will then update you about the next experiments!

Follow our LinkedIn Showcase page

Are you a LinkedIn user and do you want to stay updated about future events? Follow our Showcase page and get all the latest information as soon it’s available!

Coverage by The MICE Blog

The Rotterdam Experiment has already attracted a lot of attention from partners and organisations in the industry, and from the media. The MICE Blog (by professional industry blogger Irina Graf) is following the Rotterdam Experiment closely and reproting about the experiments and the learnings we can take from them on social media. Make sure to follow The MICE Blog on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube.

Follow and share

Stay up to date about this event on social media via

#RotterdamExperiment