Steve Monnington, CEO of Mayfield Merger Strategies, summarises the biggest transaction of the month and explores the circular relationship between founders and the larger acquisitive organisers.
How 2026 M&A has started
Another six exhibitions and three event services acquisitions continue M&A momentum.
The biggest news of the month is the mega merger of Informa’s B2B Live Events business in the UAE and wider IMEA region with the Dubai World Trade Centre’s (DWTC) B2B Live Events business to form “inD”.
Informa will own 52% of the business, which is expected to generate $650m in revenue in 2026. To put that in perspective, this would be enough to place inD fifth in the most recent STAX Top 20 exhibition organisers.
The JV will operate over 40 major B2B brands across key sectors such as Healthcare (WHX Dubai), Energy (Middle East Energy), Aviation (Dubai Air Show), Food & Beverage (Gulfood) and Information & Communications Technology (GITEX Global). There is already press speculation around plans for an IPO of the business.
It’s not often we get to cover M&A in the event services segment of the sector. UK-based Creative Live, a provider of contractor services to the exhibition and live events sectors, has acquired the stand-building company Event Specialists, along with Space Studio Graphics.
Creative Live has been on a fast growth trajectory over the last few years, continually expanding its services by amalgamating several companies owned by its individual shareholders into one business. Creative Hire. Creative Hub, Be Creative and Creative Event Spaces have all been integrated into the Creative Live mothership over the last year or so, and these latest two acquisitions are the final pieces in the jigsaw.
Will there be enough acquirable businesses to feed the hungry acquirers?
With exhibition M&A accelerating and private equity firms pursuing aggressive buy-and-build strategies, a logical question emerges: at what point does consolidation create a shortage of businesses to acquire?
Most shows within large organisers’ portfolios were either bought from entrepreneurs or geo-cloned from acquired brands. Genuine organic launches are rare. The real risk-takers are founders who bootstrap events with a clear objective: build, scale and sell. In 2025, 49 of 73 transactions (67%) involved founder-led businesses.
Here lies the paradox.
- The M&A ecosystem — and the growth model of PE-backed organisers — depends on a steady supply of entrepreneurs willing to launch and exit. Yet buyers almost always require sellers to remain for at least two years, often longer. Entrepreneurs, by nature, are not corporate operators. They thrive on autonomy, speed and ownership — not integration plans and reporting lines.
- Their motivation is capital realisation. But to achieve it, they must sell to corporate buyers who then require them to stay.
- Each time this happens, an entrepreneur is effectively removed from the launch-and-sell cycle. Multiply that effect across a consolidating market and the pipeline of future acquisitions begins to narrow.
If too many founders are retained by buyers , or are discouraged from launching again on their own terms, the current M&A driven growth for buyers will not continue indefinitely. So far there are enough entrepreneurs feeding the system but the time between launch and sale is shrinking and the shortage is of scaled businesses. The increasing interest in other models such as 1-2-1’s and Summits is helping to drive innovation and creating new verticals but ultimately, for supply to keep up with demand will require active encouragement from the buyers. The story of Elite Exhibitions shows that this is possible.
Elite Exhibitions as a case study
Toby Walters joined exhibition company Smarter Shows, owned by James Reader, as a salesperson at 21, working on a new launch — the Electric and Hybrid Vehicle Technology Expo, co-located with Battery Show, which had been launched two years earlier. A few years later, Reader called Walters into his office: “Good news — I’ve sold the show to UBM.”
Walters had no idea exhibitions could be sold, or that larger organisers would pay millions for a successful event. He faced a choice: stay with Smarter Shows and launch another show, or move with the sale to UBM. When he read from an online announcement by financial due diligence provider BDO that UBM had paid around $14 million for the show, he chose a third path: if that kind of money could be made on a show he had helped grow, why not go out and do it himself?
In 2016, Walters and fellow employee Sam Murray set up Elite Exhibitions, without a clear idea of what they would launch. It was Reader who drew their attention to a BBC report on the cruise sector — the largest part of travel and tourism, with many new ships being built. Research revealed that there were no exhibitions focussed on cruise ship design, and Cruise Ship Interiors was born, supported by their ex-boss Reader who took a 20% stake. Fast forward to April 2024 and, after creating two market-leading shows in London and Miami, Walters and Murray sold Elite to CloserStill Media.
Less than two years later, in January 2026, Walters and Murray are in their new three-person office. Strive Exhibitions is the name on the door, and Hospitality Interiors Europe is the name on the floorplan. In the 21 months since selling Elite, CloserStill had relocated the European show to Hamburg, supercharging growth and internal management has moved into the leadership roles, while the former owners regained the freedom to start again.
With a successful exit behind them, Walters and Murray have the credibility in the market they were lacking first time around. They have several years of hard work ahead before their next exit, but all parties are seemingly happy that the cycle of launch — sell — launch continues. It’s a vivid illustration of how entrepreneurial energy fuels the market, even in a consolidating landscape.
Transactions announced since the last column.
| Buyer/Investor | Business | Sector | Country |
| 2026 | |||
| Informa and Dubai World Trade Centre | inD Joint Venture | Too many to mention | IMEA |
| Montgomery Group | Halldale Group | Aviation | USA, Europe & Asia |
| Bridgepoint | Exile Group | Commodities | USA, Europe & Asia |
| Event Venture Group | Longevity Show | Life Sciences | UK |
| Connect Media | Networld Media Group | Retail, Banking & Technology | USA & Canada |
| IAEE | Exhibitor Group | Exhibitions | USA |
| Messe Munich | Tradeshow Logic | Event Services | USA |
| Creative Live | Event Specialists | Event Services | UK |
| Creative Live | Space Studio Graphics | Event Services | UK |