UK - The Lifting Equipment Engineers Association (LEEA) has launched the LEEA Connect App (Version 2.0). For the first time, the free to download app is available not only to LEEA members but also to non-members. This means it can be downloaded by engineers, examiners and anyone with an interest in the safety or technical aspects of lifting operations.
The new app delivers technical guidance, documentation, the latest LEEA news feeds, safety alerts as well as access to the LEEA Library and other information straight into a user’s smart device.
Ross Moloney, CEO of LEEA, sa

UK - Latitude Festival offered a wide range of entertainment and interactive activities to its 45,000 audience, July 2023, with Serious Stages supporting the promoters, Festival Republic, with bespoke stages and site structures.
The main stage Obelisk Arena, a Serious 22m, six-bay Supanova, adorned with Latitude branding and giant screens, hosted a varied line-up for the Common People with their New Shoes On, on the Green Green Grass of Latitude. There was more live music on a range of Serious staging platforms across the three-day festival, including the BBC Sounds Stage, The Alc

UK - The UK premier of the much-publicised movie, Barbie, took place 12 July at Cineworld Leicester Square. Limited Edition Event Design with support from IPS (Impact Production Services) produced the event.
Helping to create the colourful scene was a collection of 272 IP65 rated Chauvet Professional video tiles and lighting fixtures from IPS’ own extensive inventory.
“As most of the action at a premiere event takes place outside, IP rated equipment is the most suitable, since it allows everything to keep operating whatever happens with the weather,” Tom Warden

UAE - As house riggers at the Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi, Unusual Rigging & Engineering is used to handling the requirements of the array of different events that are hosted there. However, The International Indian Film Academy Awards 2023 presented URE with its biggest project at the venue to date.
URE’s Richard Hoare explained: “IIFA is a massive event - the Bollywood equivalent to the Oscars - held annually, it celebrates the best talent the Indian film industry has to offer. This year we were asked to supply our venue rigging services for the event. This involved more

Spain - HOF has confirmed that it has appointed Acson as a distribution partner in Spain. The cooperation will start with immediate effect.
Acson is a professional lighting and sound system distribution company that has been in the industry for more than 30 years.
Alex Costa, managing director at Acson, says: “Many of our customers are production companies that need brands and products that help them reduce set-up and dismantling times for their shows across Spain. We found HOF to be the perfect match to what we were looking for to be able to meet our customers’ requirem

UK - Unusual Rigging will commence building works on a ‘ground-breaking’ new headquarters today, 26 July as part of its commitment to respond to the climate emergency.
The innovative project is set to see the company pave the way as pioneers - showing what can be done towards regenerative design within the built environment whilst also sharing the obstacles they face with the wider industry.
The organisation, known for its work on events like the Olympics, the World Cup and West End and touring theatre hit shows, says it is taking ‘a huge leap forward’ in their commi

Portugal - Europalco delivered a memorable event using Kuka robots for the truck and bus manufacturer Fuso to unveil the new eCanter, a light truck 100% electric. Prime Minister António Costa, Secretary of State for the Economy Pedro Cilínio, and company representatives were among the 150 guests.
Team4 relied on Europalco to organise the one-day event at Fuso's manufacturing plant in Tramagal, Portugal. It took two days and 20 dedicated audiovisual and structural technicians to assemble and programme an event that marked the commencement of the manufacturing of the new Fuso tru

UK - Pearce Hire has announced the opening of its new warehouse in Peterborough. The new facility aims to streamline workflows and enhance the quality of services provided.
Located in the heart of Peterborough, the expansion from 17,000 to around 27,000sq.ft of floor space will not only help the business to grow upon its already extensive inventory of lighting, sound, video and rigging equipment, as well as its staging and power distribution systems but also offer more space to prepare and process equipment for different departments.
As projects started to increase after th

Denmark - Entertainment automation specialist, Motor Stage Automation (MSA), has made a substantial investment in Kinesys, comprising 30 x Kinesys Apex 500 Kg hoists and 30 x Kinesys Apex V2 drives plus three Mentor 401 safety controllers - offering SIL3 safety over Ethernet and safety control of up to 60 devices simultaneously.
This follows up a second-batch purchase of 21 x Kinesys Apex 500 Kg hoists and 26 x Kinesys V1 Drives, a Mentor 401 and Vector control delivered last year, bringing MSA’s current total of Apex hosts to 72, including Apex 1250Kg motors that arrived when t

UK - 50 Cent, Lil Yatchty, Travis Scott and D_Block Europe were among the urban music line-up appearing on the Serious 25m TZ Roof at Wireless Festival last week.
Serious Stages is supplying stages and site structures for Festival Republic across a range of UK festivals throughout the summer and has recently returned to Wireless Festival.
Serious operations manager Abbey Thomas says: “We work closely with Festival Republic’s creative and production teams to design and install stages that meet the needs of the headliners, while also creating a unique aesthetic for their

UK - Star Live, the specialist production agency that delivers live event and specialist build solutions, has secured a significant investment from LDC, part of Lloyds Banking Group.
Star Live was responsible for the bespoke stage, grandstand seats and Royal Box at last month’s Coronation Concert. The company has delivered other major projects at events including the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo, the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, BST Hyde Park and the Platinum Jubilee, along with stadium tours by acts such as Adele.
The business is enjoying considerable growth, having

UAE - Dubai-based iRIG has announced its partnership with Eilon Engineering as the exclusive distributor of their Ron StageMaster load monitoring systems. The partnership became effective on 1 June 2023, marking a significant milestone for both companies in expanding their presence in the Middle East market.
Eilon Engineering’s innovative load cell technology and commitment to quality have earned them a solid reputation among professionals worldwide. By partnering with iRIG, Eilon Engineering aims to leverage their expertise and strong regional presence to better serve customers

South Africa - Andrea ‘Dray’ Fowler has joined DWR Distribution’s sales team in Johannesburg.
For the past nine years, Dray has worked for a company that specialises in signage lighting while her career has seen her operate in business finance, office automation and sales.
“I knew about DWR Distribution from my husband Clint who also works in the live events industry, and from our friend Kyle Robson who works at DWR,” said Dray. “It always sounded like a vibey organisation where I've heard they work hard, play hard and fight hard. To me it seemed like a company

Singapore - Acoustic & Lighting System has joined the international network of Fenix Stage distributors.
Discussions began at ISE Barcelona 2023. Acoustic & Lighting will add Fenix Stage's lifting towers, ground support towers and display support solutions to its product offering for the Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia and Singapore markets.
“We are delighted with this partnership, as our international expansion efforts are paying off and our network is growing rapidly,” says Fenix.
Fenix Stage sales director Alex Bryan has already presented training sessions

Denmark - Theatre and musical producers Lion Entertainment turned to automation specialist Motor Stage Automation (MSA) to provide specialist knowledge and equipment for three major moving elements and control for its production of musical Pretty Woman.
The system included Kinesys motors and control, Litec trussing and EXE trolleys in MSA custom touring dollies, and an ALFA Systems double revolve, all of which helped bring a fantastic set design by Benjamin la Cour to life, enhancing the narrative set to music and lyrics by Bryan Adams and Jim Valance.
The automation

India - Fenix Stage has appointed Stagemix Technologies as its exclusive distributor in India.
The Mumbai-based company, which currently distributes brands like DAS Audio, Adamson, and Adam Hall, will expand its product catalogue to include Fenix products. Among them are lifting towers, ground support towers, and solutions for elevating and stacking LED screens, such as the new FLES (Fenix LED Support).
"We are delighted to continue advancing in our international expansion strategy with a company like Stagemix, a reference for us in the Indian market,” says Alex Bryan, sa

UK - When Simon Marlow was brought on board as production manager for the stage version of Mrs Doubtfire in London’s West End, he turned to Unusual Rigging to meet the show’s extensive rigging needs.
The adaptation of the ‘90s movie starring Robin Williams, originated on Broadway, before transferring to the UK where it enjoyed a successful run at the Manchester Opera House. It opened at The Shaftesbury Theatre on 12 May and, like most big scale musicals, boasts several large scenic pieces to be rigged, flown and stored - along with extensive lighting and sound rigs.<

Germany - The HOF team continues to grow and has gained another event technology expert in Lars Noske.
Lars will work as product manager, and will reinforce HOF‘s product development and product management team. He has been working in the event technology industry for many years and is already very familiar with HOF's portfolio.

Portugal - The Intermunicipal Community of the Coimbra Region (CIM/RC) attracted much interest at BTL 2023 with its innovative and immersive booth.
CIM/RC was the only booth at the fair to replace promotional paper with digital screens, emphasising sustainability and quick and easy access to information. The booth was composed of a municipal counter, an auditorium for presentations and a total of 240m² that invited visitors to live a unique experience with the projections on its LED screens.
“The CIM/RC booth was the result of many months of preparation, idea development,

Denmark - Rigging and automation specialist Jimmy Johnson joins the team at Motor State Automation (MSA) led by Christian Vigsø, where he will be focusing on technical sales for MSA’s innovative solutions including the bespoke design and delivery of systems for entertainment projects involving artists, set, scenery, props, equipment, objects, or anything else that needs to move.
Motor Stage Automation (MSA) is a new company based in Denmark, working internationally.
Christian commented, “We are hugely excited about this collaboration. MSA will benefit from Jimmy’s we

USA - The Morton Salt complex in Chicago had been in operation for nearly a century before it was closed down in 2015. Today, the complex has been transformed into a multi-purpose venue for live music and other events named The Salt Shed. Boasting modern sound and lighting systems, including a comprehensive Elation stage lighting rig from Upstaging, The Salt Shed is quickly becoming a popular performance space in Chicago.
The venue spreads over 1.5 acres of land along the Chicago riverfront and can accommodate around 3,300 people indoors and 5,000 at an outdoor performance space,

UK - The ABTT has announced a programme of free skills workshops and seminars at the upcoming ABTT Theatre Show which takes place at Alexandra Palace next month.
Promoting learning, the ABTT will be encouraging conversation and collaboration through a diverse range of free inspiring seminars and discussions educating attendees on a variety of topics, including VR, automation, sound design, AI, comms, health and safety, lighting, staging in the wilderness and mental health.
Supporting training and skills development, the ABTT has arranged a selection of free hands-on workshop

UK - IPS were delighted to exhibit again at the 2023 PLASA Focus show, returning to Leeds has become a firm date in the company calendar. “The team on the stand met lots of familiar faces during the busy two-day event and had lots of productive conversations about upcoming projects and the latest hire items in the IPS inventory,” says IPS’ Tom Warden. “There was also interest in the IPS offering from new potential customers, as well as students and others interested in starting out within the technical events industry.”
The IPS stand was consistently busy as people visit

UK - Eurovision star Sam Ryder recently paid a visit to London’s RD Studios as brand partner to Vodafone.
This marks Ryder’s first venture into brand association since his public breakthrough in 2020. Rising to prominence after posting music covers on TikTok during lockdown, he went on to represent the United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest 2022, finishing first in the jury vote and second overall, and was recently voted the UK’s favourite Eurovision entry of all time.
Captured in the colossal Studio 3, the shoot involved creating an entire concert (comp

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