KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Advertisers Association (MAA) has postponed The MAA Marketer Conference 2020, which is scheduled to take place on March 27 here.
The decision had been taken amid serious concerns for the safety and public health of conference participants and overseas speakers who were expected to travel during the critical phase of the current COVID-19 outbreak, MAA said.
“We have close exchanges with official authorities monitoring the situation in Malaysia as well as the region. Continued health concerns and recent advisories prompted the council members to discuss the evolving situation and the review of all progressive information extensively.” MAA president Mohamad Kadri Mohamed Taib said in a statement.
“Our utmost priority is to ensure the safety and well-being of our members and business partners at our events. Supporting a worldwide epidemic prevention effort is also key.”
Kadri believes that deferring the conference to a later date in June was the correct decision at this juncture to mitigate all risks and special challenges that arises from this critical period of the virus outbreak.
“Our thoughts are with those affected by the recent Covid-19 outbreak all around the world and would like to applaud the dedicated efforts of all medical personnel fighting the outbreak at the frontline to contain further spread of the virus.
Themed “Taking On The Digital Dichotomy: Make Disruption Work!”, the conference is a gathering of professionals from the wide community of marketing, advertising, commercial communications as well as media owners.
It is to deep-dive into the many questions that corporate marketers are still asking about digital transformations and how organisations can learn, innovate and thrive from this wave of disruption that has already shaken up many established industry structures.