About Fiona Festival
We believe that technology can be your friend instead of your enemy. That is why our film festival management software is designed to be effective, user-friendly, and easy to use. With many years of experience in IT as well as in event management, we have created Fiona – but not without the collaboration with great Dutch film festivals.
We are based in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. If you are in the neighborhood, come to say hi!
Let us introduce ourselves
Our team
The team behind Fiona has been working with film festivals for over 15 years. That’s how we distinguish ourselves, by combining our experiences in development and event organization. So, let us introduce to you: our team – the people you are likely to run into when calling or passing by.
Roland van Putten, technical director
Roland is co-founder and technical director of Fiona. He helps many film festivals as a technical consultant with a deep understanding of festival processes.
Digna van Nielen, client success manager
Digna is our client success manager and Fiona-Jedi, ever since the start of the company. With years of experience at Fiona and various film festivals, she knows exactly what you need. Ask her anything and she knows!
Peter Goldman, art director
Peter is co-founder of Fiona. He heads the design team and is responsible for marketing.
Helen Eskandari, customer support
Helen is our customer hero with a love for social media. She keeps our blog & socials up to date and is the first to know what to watch at a film festival while at the same time looking after our users with a smile.
Laura Schenkels, customer support
Laura is our other customer hero, with a keen eye for details. Steering us away from bugs and typos, she knows her way around Fiona and helps our users navigate through the system while expanding our helpdesk articles with great advice.
Mek van 't Hoff, UX designer/developer
Mek is UX and interaction designer as well as an accomplished developer. He combines an eye for aesthetics and detail with JavaScript magic.
Erik, developer
Hard-core developer, security fetishist. Some say he is a hacker and he codes even in his sleep. All we know he is Fiona’s secret weapon and remains clouded in mystery.
Sjoerd de Vries, developer
Sjoerd is Fiona’s talented front-end developer. A tenacious problem solver who likes a challenge and has a soft spot for Google Analytics and gastro tapas.
How it all started
Our film festival management software story
Fiona Festival is made for festivals and powered by festivals.
In 2015, we partnered up with IFFR, IDFA, and NFF to create a new online platform. Although the three biggest Dutch film festivals are unique in their festival programming and other activities, they also have many in common. Each festival goes through the same research and selection stages, inviting guests, programming shows, publishing the data to the website, et cetera. Differences can be found in their data and content and sometimes in how they set up their workflows.
We aimed to create one platform based on the latest technologies, designed around a festival’s most important work processes. While at the same time feeling like a unique product, which could accommodate specific workflows and data for any festival. Working together on one platform should decrease the yearly costs for each festival. Additionally, the festivals would also learn a lot from each other.
Fiona Festival has been live since 2016. We are still adding new features each year, thanks to our great partners who keep us updated about the latest changes in the film festival world. Meanwhile, we search continuously for new technologies to keep Fiona the best film festival management software.
