Venue Requirements for the APRICOT Summit Network
One of our bigger challenges is to find a suitable venue to host the APRICOT Summit. Conference week has a requirement to support 3 parallel tracks, plus provide up to a dozen small meetings rooms for APRICOT sponsor meetings and our co-organising partner, APNIC. This means that venue selection becomes quite a thorough process carried out by the Secretariat along with the potential local partner.
Venue for the Workshop Week
The APRICOT technical training, known as the APRICOT Workshops, take place the week prior to the conference.
The workshops are usually held in the conference venue itself, but do not have to be located there. Usually any full capability training venue like a College or University has suitable facilities, and can be a good location to run the APRICOT Workshops.
The workshop facility requirements are listed below:
- Provide up to 5 rooms to support up to 5 parallel workshops
- Each room layout needs to be either classroom or mini-banquet layout for 36 participants - this requirement is discussed with instructors when agreeing the workshop topics.
- Be able to support up to three instructors, plus have a separate table or area for the training equipment
- Guideline room size of at least 10m x 8m
- Provide one ethernet drop in each room via Cat5e or Cat6.
- Have completely unrestricted Internet access (see Network Requirements for reference)
- Single power outlet per participant
- At least 4-gang power outlet for instructor team
- Protected power outlet (via UPS) to a 4-gang power strip for the instructor training equipment)
- Projector (supporting at least High Definition 16x9 format) with preferably HDMI connectors (VGA only as a last resort)
- Whiteboard (2m x 1m) and flip chart, with suitable marker pens
- Recycling and General Waste bins
- Drinking water table at the side of the room
Microphones/audio amplification is not necessary, not unless the room itself has poor acoustics. There are no remote participation requirements other than any organised by the instructors themselves with their own training equipment.
Water bottles and glasses must not be placed on the training room tables, but at the side of the room in a dedicated spot. The use of plastic for water bottles is discouraged - providing water dispensers or recyclable glass bottles is strongly recommended.
The venue itself needs to have sufficient common space to serve the refreshment breaks mid-morning and mid-afternoon, as well as a suitable venue to serve a light lunch for workshop participants. Lunches are normally standing buffets, or sandwiches, or similar light snacks.
The rooms also need to be secured when not in use. Ideally the APRICOT Secretariat will have the keys to each room, but if that is not possible, venue Security must be on-site when rooms require to be unlocked on demand in the mornings, locked during lunch breaks, and locked again at the end of the day. This is especially important if the venue is a public space, like a University campus, or a Convention Centre, or a hotel.
Venue for the Conference Week
One important feature of any APRICOT Conference venue is its proximity to other facilities in the chosen location. The main conference hotel will be where most delegates opt to stay, but for those on limited budgets, or operating within corporate discount programmes, having a choice of at least 3 or 4 other hotels in the neighbourhood is essential. These hotels would need to range from budget to full service.
It is also essential that the venue is easy walking distance to restaurants and cafes in the vicinity. Not every delegate wants to eat venue food day in and day out, and quite often meetings between delegates are more productive away from the conference venue itself.
Plus, choice of conference venue needs to keep the two major social events of APRICOT in mind, the Opening and Closing Socials. It is not desirable to put delegates in buses to spend a long time sitting in traffic jams to get to a social event venue - having a good choice of social venues within walking distance (15-20 minutes) is pre-requisite for final venue selection.
As for the venue itself, the conference week has a more esoteric requirement. But can be broken down into relatively simple components: public meeting space; private meeting space; secretariat functions.
The public meeting spaces are:
- Two large ballrooms, with 300 participant capacity each, in theatre style, with the two front rows set up as classroom style. These two ballrooms need to be able to be combined for Opening Plenary and Closing Plenary to allow seating for up to 600 participants. The transition needs to be completed during a 30 minute break.
- One mid-size breakout room, with 150 participant capacity, in theatre style, with the two front rows set up as classroom style.
- Peering Meet-me room, mini-banquet style, with seating for up to 4 participants per small round table. Room size should be sufficient for up to 8 such arrangements.
- General public space suitable to host up to twenty 2m x 1m display booths for the Sponsor Demonstration Area. This area needs to be large enough to allow the mid-morning and mid-afternoon breaks to be set up in the middle of the Sponsor area.
- Suitable space in the general public area for a sponsored Coffee Cart, including provision of power (3-phase is usually required) and ventilation.
- Suitable space in the general public area for a sponsored Ice Cream Cart.
- Restaurant or similar area to serve a light buffet lunch to all delegates.
The general public area mentioned above must have adequate seating to allow delegates to sit down and hold small informal meetings, if they require. Usually two or three chairs around a small coffee table is the ideal setting.
The private meeting space requirements are:
- Two meeting rooms, Board room style, suitable for up to 15 participants
- Six small meeting rooms, Board room style, suitable for up to 8 participants
- Three small meeting rooms, suitable for up to 5 participants.
- Prayer Room
The Secretariat functions require:
- Registration Counter, to seat 6 members of APRICOT staff, to register delegates and provide key contact point for delegates. Registration Counter can either be "built-in" to the facility, eg at a Convention Centre, or set up by the venue in the general public space around the conference rooms
- One general work room for Conference Secretariat, set up as Boardroom, to seat up to 10 participants.
- One storage room adjacent to the Conference Secretariat to store around 30 Pelican cases of around 1500mm by 500mm by 700mm size. This storage room can be part of the Conference Secretariat if the latter is large enough.
These outline requirements may need some adjustment depending on local facilities or any modification in the format of APRICOT. They only serve as a guideline to assist the local host work with the Secretariat to find the most suitable venue for the Summit.
Catering
While APRICOT is not a conference about food, delegates come from over 50 countries around the world, and it is essential that the venue chosen is able to cater to their dietary requirements. The main requirements for a venue is the ability to cater for:
- Omnivores
- Vegetarian
- Halal
- Gluten Free
Any other specific dietary requirements will be notified directly between Secretariat, the local host, and the chosen venue.
It is normal practice (and strongly recommended) to set up separate areas for those who have no dietary needs, kept well apart from those who have Vegetarian, Halal, or GF needs. This is for practical reasons only, so that delegates with dietary needs are able to go to their specific catering zone, rather than having to search for their specific needs in amongst the general provisioning.
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Page last updated on Friday, 21-Apr-2023 15:19:27 AEST.