Farnborough International has announced the appointment of Mark Griffin as its new Venue Consultant.

Reporting into Farnborough International’s Venue Director, Michael Watton, Mark will lead the development of business opportunities for the Farnborough International Exhibition & Conference Centre. He joins Farnborough International with a wealth of knowledge and experience from a twenty-year career in the world of exhibitions, events and publishing.

Farnborough International will launch a new, permanent exhibition and conference centre in 2018 on the site of the temporary Hall 1 building used during the biennial Farnborough International Airshow. Comprising 20,000 sqm of event space, the new structure will be flexible enough to cater for almost any kind of exhibition, conference, meeting, dinner or launch event thanks to 12,500sqm of exhibition space, 2,500 conference seats and fourteen multiple purpose-built function rooms.

Mark Griffin said: “This is an incredibly exciting time to be joining Farnborough International. With a brand new venue due to open in 2018, I feel very lucky to be helping to promote the South East’s most prestigious event space and its world-class service. I am greatly looking forward to taking the Farnborough story to a global audience of event organisers and to building a pipeline of new business and potential clients for Farnborough International Exhibition and Conference Centre”.

Venue Director, Michael Watton, said: “It’s great to have someone of Mark’s experience and calibre on board. He will bring an enormous amount of insight and wisdom to our business development plans. As a highly successful entrepreneur in the world of events, he will also speak the language of the industry and rapidly become a great advocate for our ambitious expansion”.

Farnborough International is expected to announce further additions to its venue team as plans for expanding its exhibition and conference facilities continue.