Page 7 - ITA_30th_WEB

Past, Present & Future – 30 years of the International Tube Association 5
In November 1979 the ITA organised a technical
conference in its own right in Birmingham, UK, the very
first of no less than forty seven such events run by the
Association up to the end of 2008.
1980 saw the appointment of the first ITA president, a
position held so far by seven major industry figures.
Towards the end of the 1980s John Hogg, owner of Intras
Ltd and ITA Executive Secretary, in agreement with the
ITA board, saw the need for a biennial tube exhibition to
compliment the established wire Düsseldorf event.
After negotiations with NOWEA, (now known as Messe
Düsseldorf ), the inaugural Tube Düsseldorf exhibition
took place in spring 1988.
The ITA became an official sponsor of and industry
partner to the exhibition in 1994, a partnership that
still holds good today after ten editions and a dramatic
growth in exhibition space to forty one thousand square
metres and more than one thousand exhibitors in 2008.
Membership grew steadily throughout the first decade
in the ITA’s history, in particular in the North American
region, and in 1990 the Board of Directors USA was
formed, becoming the North American Management
Board in 1992, with responsibility for the ITA’s activities
in Canada, Mexico and the USA.
The region still accounts for the second largest total of
ITA members.
Formative Years
ITA booth ready for action at Tube Düsseldorf 2006 with
John Metcalfe on duty