Three national business conferences, eight gala awards dinners, and an exclusive event at property festival MIPIM will be among the highlights of the Downtown in Business events programme in 2023, as the private sector organisation celebrates its twentieth anniversary.
As ever some of the most influential private and public sector speakers from across the country will be contributing to DIB events. Among the confirmed speakers for the New Year are the West Midlands mayor Andy Street, the Liverpool City Region mayor Steve Rotheram, Manchester City Council leader Bev Craig, Leeds leader James Lewis, Education minister Gillian Keegan, shadow health minister Wes Streeting, the head of economic development for Newcastle City Council Jennifer Hartley, the CEO of Bruntwood Chris Oglesby, and the chief executives of Birmingham, Leeds, Manchester, Salford, and Wolverhampton city councils.
DIB Group chairman and CEO Frank McKenna said:
“We celebrate our twentieth anniversary next year, and so we want to deliver our biggest and best events programme ever. We hosted north of 90 events in 2022 so we will go beyond the 100 mark in 2023. However, it isn’t the quantity, but the quality of our events that makes DIB stand out from the crowd. The speakers we have managed to secure already mean that we have over 50 events in the calendar, including two national conferences and a special event in Cannes which will take place during the property festival MIPIM.”
The New Year will also see DIB introduce a second season of the ‘Downtown Den’ podcast, with the second series featuring female business and public sector leaders. Two new podcasts will be launched from the Downtown media platform in 2023. The ‘Business of Politics’ series, presented by Frank McKenna and Simon Danczuk, and the DIB Business of Sport pod, led by DIB Manchester chair Jacey Normand and the executive director of sporting academic agency VSI Andy McIntyre will also be available from January.
DIB is the fastest growing business organisation in the UK, working with decision-makers from over 1,000 companies across the country, in Liverpool, Lancashire, Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham, Cheshire, Wolverhampton, Newcastle, and London, with more locations to follow. Through an extensive and exciting events programme and social media platforms, DIB connect members with other businesses who can help them grow – and we engage with senior politicians and officials at regional and national level to promote business-friendly policies.
To view the 2023 DIB events programme, visit https://downtowninbusiness.com/events/
