Event name: Face Ahead 2026
Sector: Medical & scientific congress
Client: OIC Group
Event type: International craniomaxillofacial surgery congress, promoted by AO CMF
Location: Bangkok, Avani+ Riverside Bangkok Hotel
Dates: October 1–3, 2026
Attendees: 977 registered
Solutions: iOS and Android event app, online registration, interactive program, personal agenda, room maps, sponsor area, e-posters, virtual bag, push notifications, email
Face Ahead 2026, “Excellence Beyond Boundaries”, promoted by AO CMF, takes place in Bangkok from October 1 to 3, 2026 at the Avani+ Riverside Bangkok Hotel, bringing together surgeons, researchers, speakers and companies from the international craniomaxillofacial surgery community.
To support attendees before and during the congress, OIC Group used SharEvent for registrations, communications and the official event app, published on the App Store and Google Play.
THE CONTEXT
Face Ahead is the AO CMF meeting that brings education, research and clinical debate together in three dense days of program. The 2026 edition involved:
- 977 registered attendees from around the world
- three days across six parallel rooms
- eight session types: opening, keynotes, expert panels, interactive sessions, oral abstract sessions, society sessions and the closing ceremony
- e-posters available in the app
- a sponsor area with materials and contacts
With parallel sessions, a program that changes up to the last minute and an audience arriving from different time zones, the organizers needed a single tool, in everyone’s pocket, updated in real time.
THE CHALLENGE
The program of a surgical congress is not a list of times: every attendee builds a personal path through keynotes, panels, interactive sessions and abstract presentations that overlap in different rooms of the same hotel. The client needed to:
- make the program readable by day and by session type, with room and time always up to date
- give every attendee a personal agenda
- keep venue and room maps within reach
- put e-posters and materials in the app, with no paper
- have a direct channel for last-minute notices
- give sponsors visibility inside the tool everyone uses
All of this for an international audience, in English, with an app to download before leaving for Bangkok.
THE SOLUTION BUILT WITH SHAREVENT
Registrations ran through the event website built on SharEvent: 977 accepted registrations, with a peak of more than 400 in a single day in the weeks before the congress. Communications to attendees went out from the same platform: 2,004 emails sent, with an 87% open rate.
The Face Ahead app, branded with the congress identity, was published on the App Store and Google Play and opened to attendees before their departure. Inside it, attendees found:
- the program by day, with time, room and type of every session
- the key program by category, from keynotes to oral abstract sessions
- a personal agenda, “My Face Ahead”
- venue and floor maps for the six rooms
- the sponsor area
- e-posters and a virtual bag with the congress materials
- general information and push notifications from the secretariat
All the main congress content was gathered in a single digital environment, consistent with the event’s visual identity and always aligned with the secretariat’s control panel.
A PROGRAM YOU CAN READ IN TWO WAYS
In the app the program can be browsed by day, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, with the time, room and type of every session, and by category: from keynotes to oral abstract sessions, each type has its own color and its own list. From any session, attendees save it to their personal agenda. A room or time change made from the secretariat’s panel reaches the app immediately.
ROOMS, E-POSTERS, SPONSORS AND NOTICES IN ONE PLACE
The maps section gathers the venue and the six rooms, Moon/Lunar, Air, Galaxy 1 and 2, Sky and Wind, with the address for those arriving from outside. E-posters can be read in the app, the virtual bag collects the congress materials, the sponsor area gives visibility to partner companies, and push notifications bring the secretariat’s notices to every phone at the same moment. For the organizers this meant:
- registrations, communications and app managed from one panel
- program changes published once and seen everywhere
- no printed program or notice board
- a direct line to every attendee during the three days
without adding any complexity the attendees would notice.
THE RESULTS
Using SharEvent made it possible to bring registrations, communications and the digital experience of Face Ahead 2026 together in a single platform. The figures, read on the first day of the congress:
- 977 registered attendees, all accepted
- 846 app downloads, 622 on iOS and 224 on Android: 87% of registrants
- 1,361 app logins
- 2,004 emails sent, 1,986 delivered, 1,749 opened
Technology in the service of surgical congresses
Face Ahead 2026 shows how an app well integrated with registrations and communications simplifies the work of running an international congress with parallel sessions, and gives attendees a program, an agenda and the materials always with them, with no paper and no queue at the info desk.