Asia Music Event Picks Hong Kong's Soho House for Its First Edition. Jakarta's DWP Booker Has a Seat at the Table.

Soho House Hong Kong's members usually come for the panoramic Victoria Harbour views, not a conference. On November 26 and 27, it hosts something else: more than 1,000 industry figures and 200 companies there for panels, keynotes and networking.

Asia Music Event (AME), a new two-day conference, was announced in September and confirmed for Hong Kong's Soho House this November. It's the kind of event the region has talked about needing for years without anyone quite building it: an Asia-anchored answer to Ibiza's IMS or Miami's Music Summit, where the people who run labels, book festivals and program clubs sit in the same room as the executives who decide what streaming, licensing and touring look like next.

What AME Actually Is

Strip away the conference-speak and it's straightforward: more than 30 sessions across panels, keynotes and networking blocks, with over 200 companies taking part. Warner Music, Beatport and Zamna Festival are confirmed as partners. Programme Director Marco Zhu frames it as a two-way exchange rather than a one-off showcase: "AME is about creating a genuine two-way bridge between Asia and the international music industry, helping the world better understand Asia's unique markets and culture, while creating new opportunities for people across the ecosystem to connect, collaborate and grow," he said in comments carried by Mixmag Asia.

The numbers behind that ambition aren't small. The 2026 IMS Electronic Music Business Report puts the global electronic music industry at US$15.1 billion in 2025, still climbing. Hong Kong's Tourism Board is backing AME; its General Manager of Mega Events, MICE & Cruise, Marilyn Tham, calls the city "a super-connector" for the industry. Once the panels wrap, AME closes with a two-floor takeover of Soho House itself.

The Jakarta Connection

For a Southeast Asian reader, the interesting name on the first speaker list isn't a European label boss. It's Ayudita Hariadi, Head of Artist Bookings at Ismaya, the promoter behind Jakarta's Djakarta Warehouse Project, which just locked in Axwell Λ Ingrosso and Dimitri Vegas for its December 2026 return. Hariadi books the lineup for Jakarta's Djakarta Warehouse Project, and she'll be in the room in Hong Kong alongside the label and streaming executives shaping where the industry goes next. That's a very different kind of visibility than a lineup announcement: it's Jakarta's booking desk getting a say in how the region gets pitched to the rest of the world.

She's joined on the announced speaker roster by Beatport CCO Alex Branson, Warner Music's VP of Brand and Partnership Becky Yeung, Clinton Lau (Head of Music at INS Land and President of The Magic of Tomorrowland), Magicroom co-founder Leo Arbez, Lisbon Dance Summit co-founder Jesper Skibsby, and Sonia Lau of Swire Resources' business development team.

Why It's Worth Watching From Here

Hong Kong's own scene has had a rough couple of years of club closures and promoters moving on, something we wrote about when Shanda left the city for Berlin after selling out her ABYSS parties for three years straight. A conference isn't a club, and 1,000 badge-wearing delegates in a members' club won't fix a nightlife scene on its own. But AME's organisers are explicit that this is meant to be the first of an annual event, with plans to expand into city-wide showcases and parties over the next three to five years. If it holds together, it gives promoters, labels and bookers from Bangkok to Manila a reason to fly to Hong Kong every November instead of only Miami or Ibiza, and a direct line to the people, like Hariadi, already deciding what gets booked back home.

If You Go

Dates: November 26-27, 2026. Venue: Soho House Hong Kong, Sheung Wan. Tickets are available here. The event is built for the electronic music industry and its wider scene, not a general-admission party.