A LITTLE BIT OF HISTORY

The international exhibition of the battlefield and individual combat euqipment focused on NATO and Partnership for Peace Program member countries have been held in three-yearly interval already from the year 1985. The first run took place in Portugal, then in France (1988), followed by the United Kingdom (1991), Canada (1994) and Norway (1997) but without private sector. That became involved in 2000 and this ground-breaking concept met with a highly positive response from individual NATO member countries which appreciated the possibility of meeting the military specialists with the representatives from the manufacturing and commercial field, both from NATO and new memeber countries. In 2000 this concept met with the great support of the Ministry of Defence of the Czech Republic and that's why this project moved to Prague.

The first FUTURE SOLDIER 2000 international exhibition was a major success among exhibitors and subject-matter specialists alike. Consequently, the next run also came to be organised in the region of Central Europe and it crystallised, chiefly thanks to interest and understanding by the Ministry of Defence of the Slovak Republic and relevant NATO bodies, and effectively combining NATO Workshop and CCIEP exhibitions, into the 7th International NATO Exhibition Slovakia 2003, accompanied with a session of NATO AC-301 committee in Nitra, Slovakia.

In the following years, the International Coordination Center concentrated its activities on intensive communication with prominent businesses around the world and participants in the previous exhibitions. Such feedback from exhibitors and subjectmatter experts generated many useful ideas, relating both to the exhibition’s specialisation in components of current battledresses, as well as in further expansion of the coverage, mainly with the matters in relation to the ever more sophisticated and integrated future soldier systems, command systems and future battlefi eld equipment. As the pace of technological advances in the sphere of materials permanently increases, a number of clients raised the requirement to shorten the event’s periodicity (best to be held on biennial basis), setting a fi xed date and a permanent location, where the potential of manufacturers and designers could meet with military lessons-learnt. In cooperation with the International Center for organising the exhibition, the Ministry of Defence of the Czech Republic declared its interest to create an environment favourable for the Czech Republic to become a host country for regular meetings of specialists in the above fi elds of expertise in 2008-14.

The overarching goal and keynote idea for the exhibition was always to maintain the "BE VISIBLE!" strategy. What does it entail? In the FUTURE SOLDIER 2008 exhibition, manufacturers of battledresses, accessories, protective equipment, communication technology and all other components of integrated future soldier systems will never be lost among weapon systems and heavy military hardware. The structure of visitors fully observes the principle that the FUTURE SOLDIER exhibition in Prague is to become a venue, where real needs meet true experts, which is indeed the keynote of the exhibition: "WHERE THE NEEDS MEET THE EXPERTS".

See you in Prague

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International Coordination Centre
Progres Partners Advertising, spol. s r.o.
Opletalova 55
CZ - 110 00 Praha 1, Czech Republic
Tel: +420/221 602 362, 224 234 274, Fax: +420/224 235 033
E-mail: simkova@ppa.cz
http://www.natoexhibition.org