FY 2003, like previous years, was another record-breaking year for EXCO. It set a record 69% occupancy rate in 2003, much above the year goal of 61%. Some even tends to state this as an 'epoch-making record' in Korea's convention & exhibition industry because it took only three years to achieve this rate for EXCO, while other exhibition centers generally needed seven years to reach the rate of 60%.

EXCO's giant leap is believed to be the return from a unique business strategy; differentiation from competing centers, and aggressive marketing during past couple years. EXCO's another success story in 2003 is turning the red figure into black for the first time since the center's opening.

Table 1. EXCO's Performance during past 3 years

FY	2001	2002	2003
Occupancy Rate(%)	26	35	69
Attendee (person)	600,000	780,000	900,000
Sales (Korean \)	3,900,000	6,000,000	8,200,000
Overseas attendee	5,527	6,153	10,000

Table 2. Economic Impacts generated by EXCO

FY	2001	2002	2003	Total
Production	58,300	70,300	98,400	227,000
Income	10,900	13,100	18,400	42,300
Added Value	17,800	21,500	30,100	69,400
Tax Revenue	12,000	14,500	20,300	46,900
Total Impact Generated	99,000	119,500	167,200	385,700

Since the center was opened in 2001, EXCO understood that pervading problems of Korea's exhibition industry are 1) too many small-sized trade shows, targeting only domestic market that has limited buying power 2) flooding of similar or same exhibitions 3) lack of global level exhibitions.

To avoid the blunder of following the wrong direction, EXCO set a strategy of differentiating its conventions and exhibitions from competing centers. Small-sized exhibitions repeated over and over again by other centers, such as wedding shows and general IT shows, were excluded from its options. While, greatest efforts were put on organizing global-level trade shows based on robust local businesses.
This strategy has been kept as an important backbone principle of EXCO, until now.

EXCO's best exhibitions are, in most cases, closely related to local-specialized businesses such as eyewear, machineries, textile & textile machineries. Some examples are DIOPS (eyewear), DAMEX (auto-machines), KORTEX (textile machines), PID (textile and fashion), and IMID (information display).

The firm bases of our shows, thriving local businesses, have been and will be the leaping board for the EXCO's best exhibitions.

Daegu International Fire & Safety EXPO, EXCO's ambitious new project, is another example of realizing differentiation strategy. This show is inspired by a tragic experience of Daegu city; a subway fire in 2003 that left 192 victims and hundreds of the wounded.

Fire EXPO is the result of collective effort to transform a tragedy into an opportunity to promote the preparedness for future disasters. It also is expected to boost the nation's Safety-related industry.

Motorcycle Show 2004 also is an extension of differentiation strategy. Daegu city is the inland transportation-hub in south-east Korea and has highly developed vehicle-parts industry, which is why it is the optimal place for motorcycle show. This show will be the first of the kinds in the country and will be another source for pride for EXCO and the city.