Experiential technology trends at the Festival of Innovation: LIVE Q&A

Join us at blooloop’s Festival of Innovation on Wednesday 7th December at 6 pm GMT, to find out about the latest innovations in experiential technology in visitor experiences. Our guest speakers will be speaking live and will also be looking into the future, highlighting trends and future tech.

There will be a live Q&A at the end of the session and we will also reveal the winners of the Experiential Technology innovation award.

Experiential technology speakers

Asa Kalama is VP executive – creative & interactive experiences at Walt Disney Imagineering. Kalama studied at the University of California’s School of Theater, Political Science and Interactive Media Design. He then became an intern within Walt Disney Imagineering’s R&D department. He progressed through the company and took up his current role in 2021.

One of his most recent credits was working on Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge at both Disneyland in California and Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Florida.

Kalama, who served as Executive Creative Director on the Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run attraction, explains how the Play Disney Parks app was used to immerse guests deeper into the Galaxy’s Edge realm. “Based on the way the guests interact with the environment, with the props within the land, what jobs they choose to go on, all of that affects the sort of persona that they’re starting to create for themselves and as a result the way the world around them starts to engage with them.”

Yiannis Cabolis is director of technology innovation at Electrosonic. In this role, he is responsible for connecting Electrosonic’s various departments and divisions around technical solutions.

He monitors developing technologies, maintains awareness of best practices, drives research and development and strengthens industry and vendor relationships to ensure that clients benefit from the firm’s optimum solutions. Cabolis has mastered the ability to solve challenges, deliver solutions and apply technology in unique ways throughout a career spanning nearly 30 years as a design consultant, chief engineer and vice-president, operations.

Electrosonic entered Summit One Vanderbilt into the Innovation Awards. The company developed and integrated the technology for a large-scale immersive experience that covers 26 unique spaces over four levels at the attraction.

Martin Howe has over 35 years’ of experience introducing and delivering new technologies across a range of demanding applications around the world. He is a creative ‘techie’, an ideas generator, a big picture thinker and a determined problem solver with the ability to translate ambitious goals into a structured plan and hands-on delivery.

Through the last decade, he has led Teq4 to become a leading creative design and engineering firm with a word-of-mouth reputation for their specialization and skills in the design and integration of unique immersive and interactive experiences. Most recently he has pioneered the development of Chaperone, which has been entered in the Innovation Awards. It is an ecosystem that connects the user (a guest of an attraction) to the experience in a highly personalised way. Chaperone allows for complex and extensive interactions between the user and all elements around them, both physical and digital.

Innovation Awards

The winners of the Experiential Technology innovation awards will be announced during this session.

The blooloop Innovation Awards 2022, presented with AREA15 showcase the incredible dynamism, imagination and creativity that drives the attractions business. Our judges are well-known thought leaders and industry experts, who are looking for the most innovative products and projects driving the future of the visitor experience.

The Innovation Awards will be announced throughout the Festival of Innovation. Attendees will be able to browse the Award entries and take part in the Public Vote Award. In addition, some of our judges and industry leaders will be talking about exciting new trends and operators will share what innovations they really want to help them drive forward visitor experiences.