Palais des Festivals et des Congrès News

The precursor of the new Midem, from 19 to 21 January 2023 at the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès de Cannes and the Gare Croisette, was a great success with a wonderful line-up (Jean-Michel Jarre, Sofiane Pamart, Hyphen Hyphen, Fatboy Slim etc) and more than 9000 spectators who attended MIDƐM+LIVE concerts. This international event, sponsored by Jean-Michel Jarre, brought together the first members of the MuSee+ community and several dozen speakers around quality conferences and talks. The first 100 founding members were there to build together the future MIDƐM+, a new event model based on a community to make MIDƐM+ the Cannes Music Festival. The next edition of MIDƐM+ is scheduled for 24 to 27 January 2024 at the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès.

Midem, the cult meeting of the music industry, is being reborn and becomes MIDƐM+: an augmented, experimental and collaborative festival that places music at the heart of the challenges of tomorrow. The first manifestation of the new Midem will take place between 19 and 21 January 2023 at the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès de Cannes. To mark the return of this famous event, which ended in 2019, Cannes Town Hall is relying on an exceptional patron, in tune with the ambitions of MIDƐM+: Jean-Michel Jarre, pioneer of electronic music in France and a global star. For this occasion, he is offering us three live concerts
from his new album OXYMORE, in multi-channel 3601 sound.

During a town council meeting on 28 November 2022, the Town Hall approved its Palais des Festivals et des Congrès adopting the status of entreprise à mission1, which was ratified by the Extraordinary General Meeting of the SEMEC shareholders on 12 December 2022. This approach comes under the framework of the PACTE law (Action plan for business growth and transformation) of 2019, which introduced the quality of a société à mission, allowing a company to formalize its reason for being and define its social and environmental objectives. This is a major challenge for sustainable competitiveness.
The Palais des Festivals de Cannes is the first conference centre to become a société à mission.

2022 was marked by a remarkable performance from the tourism and events activity in Cannes. This success was crowned at the end of this year with the title “Best events destination in the world 2022”, doubled by the European prize, awarded by the reference, the World Travel Awards.

Last May, the Cannes City Hall took over the Midem brand (Marché International du Disque et de l’Edition Musicale, International Record and Musical Edition Market). While the music professionals’ legendary event ceased to exist in 2019, David Lisnard’s goal is to bring it back to life to reinforce the city’s economic drive and its leading position in the creative and cultural industries, by making the event part of the “Cannes On Air” programme.  In order to turn the new Midem into the musical industry’s major global event, the Cannes municipality and Palais des Festivals et des Congrès have selected a multidisciplinary team with complementary talents.   These include Hopscotch, international global communication group, All Over/Panda Events, organiser of wide-ranging cultural events and music festivals, and Pianity, the first French platform dedicated to the purchase, sale and exchange of music Non-Fungible Tokens (NFT). The first edition of the new Midem will take place from 19 to 22 January 2023.

At the screening of the series "The English" at the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès in Cannes, for the opening of the 38th edition of MIPCOM, Emily Blunt performed the traditional handprint ceremony, reserved for high-profile personalities. 

The Palais des Festivals and Congresses of Cannes obtains for the first time in February 2021, the North America’s top health certification for public hospitality facilities : GBAC STAR™ Facility. Awarded by the Global Biorisk Advisory Council*, it attests to the implementation of the strictest protocols in terms of cleaning, disinfection and prevention of infectious diseases within the establishment. Already awarded to the largest convention centres in the United States, this accreditation has for the first time been awarded to a convention centre in France. 
In April 2022, the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès receives again this accreditation. 

In November 2019, the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès de Cannes for the first time obtained ISO 18788 certification, issued by the independent body APAVE. The result of a joint policy with the City of Cannes, it became the first certified congress centre in France. In March 2022, the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès was awarded this certification again.

The Hybrid City Alliance continues to go from strength to strength, demonstrated through its recent win of the coveted ICCA Best Marketing Award.  The accolade, which was awarded on the last day of the ICCA Global Congress recognised the Hybrid City Alliance’s focus on partnership and community.  

The Palais des Festivals et des Congrès and the Cannes Yacht Club wanted to organise a photographic exhibition dedicated to the Italian Carlo Borlenghi, famous photographer of the world's seas, during the 43^rd edition of the Royal Regattas.

The most beautiful photographs by this sailing enthusiast are yours to discover at the Cannes Tourist Office from 18 to 25 September.

The Cannes Film Festival in July was a real success and shows the confidence that’s returned thanks to Cannes’ professionalism. As early as 25 August, Vorwerk confirmed this trend by organising its show and welcomed the resumption of face-to-face activity with digital support. Thus, in Cannes, events can be organised in optimal health conditions. All the provisions have been brought together to reassure organisers and their clients, provide them with support and solutions, GBAC Star Facility health certification, medical concierge service,  creation of a digital studio, the Hi5 permanent studio... From September to the end of the year, the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès is bringing back its major exhibitions, a hope that’s been rediscovered in the events sector and for the Cannes economy.

The Palais des Festivals et des Congrès de Cannes places innovation and technology at the heart of its new facilities. Today, it unveils its permanent digital studio, the Hi5 studio. A real television studio, with its own set, it’s equipped with state-of-the-art technologies to adapt to each client. As the event sector continues to recover, it forms an essential tool for organizers to ensure the success of their hybrid or 100% digital events.  

From 24 July to 21 August 2021, every evening from 10.00pm to 11.30pm, the façade and steps of the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès de Cannes will be lit up to the accompaniment of a musical creation. This year, this 10-minute sound and light show will be broadcast for the first time on the entire façade of the Palais to form part of the theme of the summer cultural programme: cinema.

The scenography for this giant "mapping", designed by Les Ateliers Athem, puts on display the history of cinema and the Festival with a reinterpretation of cult films.

It provides a gateway to a surreal journey leading from the iconic steps to different cinematic horizons.

The visual pictures with their interplay of perspectives and illusion will feature films that have left their mark on Cannes and cinema.

What’s more, for the first time, a trompe-l'oeil "red carpet" will take place at the top of the steps to set the stage for the Palais by day.

The call for applications to become a Cannes Ambassador on TikTok has proved a great success. In just two weeks, the Cannes Tourist Office received several hundred applications.

Ambassadors were selected based on 3 criteria: creativity, mastery of the TikTok codes and their motivation to produce content on Cannes.

Episode 1, Season 1 – Leisure

On 24 June, the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès de Cannes is launching Cannes My Way, an innovative digital experience to promote the destination to travel agencies, tour operators, incoming reception agencies and the national and international tourist press. This original event aims to help them discover everything that’s new in the destination, as well as putting them in contact with Cannes’ professionals for the purpose of developing their businesses as tourist activity gets back underway.

A new video to promote the Cannes destination to professional customers and event organizers.

The Palais des Festivals et des Congrès de Cannes is deploying a new digital strategy. It places innovation and technology at the heart of its new arrangements and offers an event format combining the best of the real and virtual worlds with the aim of maintaining physical encounters while developing new digital solutions to prepare an offer adapted to new event formats. With the launch of a new 3D solution operated by Laval Virtual, the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès offers a concrete package for even more effective hybrid events.

A group of Convention Bureaux offering an innovative multiplex package to international event organisers.

After obtaining the “Sanitary Security Label” and “Ecovid Label” issued by SOCOTEC, in February 2021, the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès de Cannes was awarded North America’s top health certification for public hospitality facilities: GBAC STAR™ Facility. Awarded by the Global Biorisk Advisory Council*, this certification attests the implementation of the strictest protocols in terms of cleaning, disinfection and prevention of infectious diseases within the establishment. Already issued to the largest convention centres in the United States, this certification has for the first time been awarded to a convention centre in France. The Palais once again proves its commitment to hosting international events with the utmost respect for health protocols.
 

The health and economic consequences of Covid-19 are having a severe impact on the tourism sector, whose total international tourism revenues, combined from January to August 2020, recorded a loss of 18.8 billion euros compared to 2019 (-46.8%), according to the Bank of France. In the face of this unprecedented crisis, the City of Cannes and its Palais des Festivals et des Congrès are introducing a new strategy entitled "Cannes Resilience". The aim is to take a collective approach to stop this negative spiral to save and revive business and leisure tourism.