YOU’D BE FORGIVEN for thinking that the motor show, in its traditional sense at least, is going the way of the manual gearbox. Once the leviathan of shows, Frankfurt IAA was the place to be for all the key brands in Europe, but it has now moved to Munich and attracts a fraction of the manufacturers. An Australian equivalent is long gone, Geneva is back in Switzerland after a panic move to Doha, and Detroit’s dates were muscled into a different end of the year by the growing might of the Consumer Electronics Show. The motor-show world is now a very different space.
Whether it be a post Covid-19 society nervous of large gatherings or the various brands favouring smaller satellite presentations where they can more carefully control their marketing messages and audience, it would appear the glory days are over. Except they aren’t… as demonstrated by Auto China 2024. The big motor show is back!
After a four-year hiatus, the Beijing show has returned and, unlike other shows that
