My friend, Mark Tripolisiotis, works for Reed Exhibitions, a trade show management company. I had the opportunity to photograph a few events for them, one of which was the ISPE/Interphex Leadership Awards Dinner in New York City.
I photographed this event three years in a row (2011, 2012 and 2013) and anytime it came up, friends or family would ask, “well what is it?” I would fumble and stumble around saying, “I don’t know. It’s something with Mark’s company and has something to do with pharmaceuticals and biotech and....”
Here is the correct answer:
ISPE is the International Society for Pharmaceutical Engineering, a group for professionals involved in the engineering and manufacturing of pharmaceuticals and related products. Interphex is a trade show where biotech and pharmaceutical professionals display products and services that aid in manufacturing and supply chains.
(Admittedly, I got all of that information from their websites...)
It’s actually a really big deal. These are some of the most important people on the planet. Here’s a “for instance” that helped it make sense to me:
What happens if there’s a flu epidemic?
Hospitals can’t hold that much of the flu vaccine if the entire population was to need it all at once. We would probably assume, and would like to know that there is a facility or series of facilities somewhere that the medical community is going to go to, to retrieve large volumes of the vaccine to help everyone quickly. Thankfully, there are facilities out there that hold all of the vaccine that we would need in case of an epidemic.
That’s who/what ISPE and INTERPHEX deals with and what this event is about.
This is an awards dinner to recognize and reward facilities like this throughout the world. The awards are based on how efficiently they manufacture pharmaceuticals or how well they have been architecturally designed in terms of LEED standards or how well they operate with respect to energy efficiency. (Think: EnergyStar)
Each year it is a very nice event. In 2011, it was held at the Union League Club in NYC.
In 2012, which are the following images, it was held at the Yale Club, also in NYC.
(Note, I did not do a full job as photojournalist on these evenings; I do not have the names and titles of those photographed. I simply provided the full batch of images to my client after the event. I am sharing the images as an example/sample of my event photography.)
As mentioned previously, I photographed the 2013 Interphex event, again held at the Yale Club in NYC. I may come back to create a separate post for the 2013 Interphex Dinner but if not, here are a few images from the event. Similar moments to those above, but I was happy to have a Nikon D700 with me for this round:
