Municipality of Maastricht takes over the MECC conference centre Maastricht from the RAI

The municipality of Maastricht, is taking over the MECC conference centre Maastricht from Amsterdam RAI. For years, the RAI, which has 75 percent of the shares of the operating company of MECC, in a joint venture with the municipality, has been wanting to get rid of its interests in the loss-making exhibition and convention center. The municipality wants to retain the MECC for Maastricht, because it has an economic spin-off of about 60 million euros per year. In addition, as the owner of the property, closing would cost the municipality 3.6 million euros in rent, maintenance expenses and capital losses on investment and, moreover, would lead to a loss of employment of 45 direct and 600 indirect jobs. On Friday, 5 April, the city of Maastricht presented the RAI and the management of MECC conference centre Maastricht with the details of the agreement in the presence of the Collaborating Hotels Maastricht, the Maastricht Convention Bureau and Maastricht Health Campus. The revised strategy of the Amsterdam RAI is the basis for the proposal of the RAI to terminate the joint venture. Exploiting another convention and exhibition center in the Netherlands, unlike in Amsterdam, no longer fits into the strategic direction of the RAI. The municipality will consolidate the complex and the activities in a new public company: MECC Maastricht BV. In 2013 and 2014, the city and RAI will disentangle the cooperation. The management of the new public company will set up a business plan in which future opportunities and possibilities in the market can be mapped out. Spearheads will be campus development -- with the MECC as the scientific meeting place and host of medical conferences -- Maastricht and the Euregion, European Cultural Capital 2018 and the continuation of the commitment of the international art fair, TEFAF, to Maastricht. In the period after 2014, the MECC conference centre Maastricht must achieve acceptable profits. The board will ask the City Council, in its meeting on 23 April 2013, to accept the outcome of the negotiations.