On the Friday before the American Society of Hematology (ASH) opens its 2026 annual meeting, satellite symposia fill four blocks of the day: 7:00 to 10:00, reserved for nonprofit organisers, then 11:00 to 14:00, 15:00 to 18:00 and 19:00 to 22:00. A standard slot costs between 125,500 and 161,000 US dollars, depending on the audience size booked. Every one of these sessions must offer CME (continuing medical education) credit, and none of them may present itself as part of the ASH meeting (ASH, 2026).
That is a satellite symposium: a session paid for by a company, held during the congress and usually in its venue, but outside the scientific programme. The congress sells the slot, the room and access to its audience. The company, or a medical education partner it funds, delivers the content.
The price list shows what sponsors are really buying. They are not paying for a room, because a hotel rents rooms for far less. They pay for delegates who came because they trust the scientific programme. That is why the separation between satellites and science is not paperwork around the product. It is the product.
At many societies, two people negotiate that line: the person who sells the slots and the chair of the scientific committee, who has to defend the programme to members. Below we show what congresses sell, how they build the slot grid, who gets which slot and which rules keep industry sessions apart from the science. The examples come from guidelines that congresses publish for their sponsors. For your own congress, your sponsors’ compliance teams and your accreditor have the final word, and nothing here is legal advice.
What is a satellite symposium?
The term is most common at medical congresses, where a large audience of specialists meets an industry exhibition. Names vary from congress to congress: satellite symposium, industry session, industry-sponsored symposium. Three features stay constant:
- A company or a medical education company working on its behalf organises and funds the session, not the society.
- The session runs in a slot the congress offers for this purpose, usually in the congress venue.
- It is labelled as not being part of the official programme.
A satellite is therefore not the same as a symposium in your scientific programme, where the committee chooses the topic and the speakers. How the labels symposium, congress and conference differ we explain in conference vs congress vs symposium. Here, the word satellite matters more than the word symposium. It orbits the programme without becoming part of it.
Why the separation is what sponsors pay for
If the satellite sits outside the programme, why do companies pay programme prices for it? Because the audience they reach is the one the programme attracted. Delegates come for the science, and a sponsored session gets their attention as long as they do not feel misled.
Freeman’s 2026 Trends Report on learning at events puts a number on that attitude. In a survey of more than 3,300 attendees and exhibitors, 30 per cent of attendees viewed sponsored sessions positively and another 54 per cent neutrally, and attendees valued expertise regardless of who the expert worked for. Freeman’s advice to organisers is to label sponsored sessions clearly (Freeman, July 2026). For you, the lesson is that delegates do not reject industry sessions. They reject disguised ones.
The regulators of medical education reach the same conclusion from the other side. The US Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) requires that learners can easily tell accredited education apart from everything else. At live events, nonaccredited education developed by or with influence from an ineligible company, which means a company that sells healthcare products, must not take place in the educational space within 30 minutes before or after an accredited session (ACCME, Standards for Integrity and Independence). The rule protects the credit. It also protects the sponsor, because a satellite that blurs into the programme devalues the very audience it paid to reach.
The chair of your scientific committee is the guardian of that value. Every rule in this guide gives the chair a reason to say yes.
What congresses sell: the package and the price
Separation starts in the price list. A satellite package usually bundles four things: a time slot, a room of a given size, promotion to registered delegates and a few badges for the organiser’s team. The examples below show how differently five congresses price and frame them.
| Congress | Slots and length | Published fee | Credit model |
|---|---|---|---|
| ASH Friday Satellite Symposia, December 2026 | Four three-hour blocks on the Friday before the meeting | 125,500 to 161,000 USD for 300 to 800 attendees; nonprofits 70,000 to 82,000 USD, morning slot only | Must offer CME through an ACCME-accredited provider |
| AASLD, The Liver Meeting, November 2026 | Lunch, 90 minutes at the convention centre; dinner, 120 minutes at the co-headquarters hotel | 65,000 USD lunch, 60,000 USD dinner | Must offer CME through an ACCME-accredited organisation |
| AIDS 2026, July 2026 | 60 or 90 minutes; prime time at lunch, in the afternoon and in the evening | 8,600 to 61,100 USD, depending on room, slot, payment date and type of organisation | No credit rule on the booking page |
| ENDO 2027, June 2027 | Two hours: 30 minutes of breakfast or dinner plus 90 minutes of content; no lunch slots | 75,000 USD, food and drink extra | CME optional, through the education partner |
| WORLDSymposium 2027, February 2027 | 60 minutes; ten slots for 20 sessions | 5,000 USD non-refundable deposit to reserve a slot | CE optional through an ACCME-accredited provider; non-CE sessions carry a fixed disclaimer |
The organisers behind the abbreviations are the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD), the International AIDS Society (IAS) and the Endocrine Society, which runs ENDO. CE stands for continuing education. All figures come from each congress’s published guidelines for 2026 or 2027.
Three pricing levers stand out, and each one is a decision you can take for your own congress:
- Audience size: ASH charges by the number of attendees booked and re-invoices if more people attend than estimated. Pricing by audience size is easy to defend because the sponsor chooses the reach.
- Time of day: AIDS 2026 charges a premium for prime time slots at lunchtime, in the afternoon and in the evening, because those slots are expected to draw more delegates.
- Type of organiser: AIDS 2026 charges academic and community organisations a fraction of the commercial rate, and ASH reserves its early morning slot for nonprofits. If you want independent voices among the satellites, price is where you make room for them.
A five-figure fee is a promise of attention. The grid has to keep it.
Build the slot grid around the programme
Prices only hold if satellites never compete with the science. Most congresses therefore place them where the scientific programme pauses: early morning, lunch and evening, or on a day before the congress opens.
The published rules show how far congresses go to protect that boundary:
- ENDO 2027 runs breakfast slots from 6:00 to 8:00 and evening slots, with no lunch slots at all.
- AASLD holds its lunch and dinner satellites outside official programme hours.
- ASH moves its satellites to the whole Friday before the meeting.
- WORLDSymposium bans satellites that compete with official programming, allows at most two per slot and never places two on the same topic in one slot.
- INS 2026, the congress of the International Neuromodulation Society, requires a break of at least 15 minutes when an industry session shares a hall with a CME session.
The common thread is simple: the science keeps the core hours, and satellites fill the edges.
Picture a delegate at 12:30 on day two. She can queue for a lunch satellite, walk to the poster hall or answer email. If two satellites on the same disease run against each other, both sponsors lose half the room, and she loses the chance to hear both. A rule against same-topic satellites in one slot serves everyone.
Draw the scientific programme first, mark the gaps and only then decide how many satellites each gap can hold. Plan the turnover time as well: the ESCRS (European Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons) allows the roll-up for a symposium at the room entrance only once the previous session has started, and ENDO gives organisers up to three hours of set-up time. Buffet satellites also fill unevenly, so the registration rules matter: how to set capacity, overbook from your own show rate and release unclaimed seats we explain in our guide to session capacity and waitlists. Too many satellites per gap turn lunch into a corridor fight.
Who gets which slot
Once the grid is fixed, demand for the prime slots usually exceeds supply. The published guidelines show four allocation rules:
- First come, first served: WORLDSymposium allocates this way at the programme committee’s discretion. AASLD also weighs the topic, the preferred date and competitive factors.
- Priority points: ESCRS allocates through its priority points system first and by date of request second.
- First come, first paid: AIDS 2026 counts when application and payment arrive. Only its major industry sponsors may choose their own slot.
- Scored review: At ASH, a study section score decides both selection and time slot.
Each rule sends a message to your partners. Points reward long-term partners, a scored review rewards content and first come rewards speed. Choose the rule you can explain to the sponsor who did not get lunch.
Whatever the rule, the sales calendar runs long. The ASH timeline for December 2026 shows how far ahead the work starts.
Example sales calendar
How ASH sells its 2026 Friday satellites
- 27 May Application Deadline for applications; the fee depends on the audience size booked, from 300 to 800 attendees.
- 16 June Acceptance Selection and time slot follow the study section score; preferred slots are not guaranteed.
- 17 July to 7 August Agreement and payment Letter of agreement first, then payment; from 8 August a cancellation costs the full fee.
- 6 November Promotion approved Signage and promotional material need approval; the ASH name and logo may not suggest an official ASH event.
- 11 December Symposium day Four blocks on the Friday before the annual meeting; room access opens 45 minutes before the start.
- 31 January 2027 Evaluation and attendance Providers submit the evaluation summary and the final attendance count; higher attendance is re-invoiced.
The rules that keep industry sessions apart
The slot keeps satellites apart in time. Four further groups of rules keep them apart in labelling, content, promotion and place.
Label every satellite as outside the programme
Disclaimers are short, fixed and non-negotiable. For non-CE satellites, WORLDSymposium requires a statement on the first page of all promotional material that the session “is not part of the official WORLDSymposium program” and “is not approved for CE by WORLDSymposium or any other entity”. ENDO 2027 requires a statement that the programme is not part of its official educational programming and is neither sponsored nor endorsed by the Endocrine Society. AASLD even regulates prepositions: “While attending The Liver Meeting 2026” is acceptable, “In conjunction with” is not. INS 2026 labels its sessions as industry sessions “not included in the main event CME/CPD credit offering”, CPD being continuing professional development. Write your wording once, put it in the contract and check every invitation against it.
Review the content, not just the title
Labels only work if the content behind them is sound. At EPA 2026, the congress of the European Psychiatric Association, the scientific committee approves every symposium programme. WORLDSymposium’s planning committee reviews topics, faculty and objectives and expects balanced content. AASLD excludes members of its governing board and journal editors from commercial presentations. ESCRS and EPA both apply an embargo: no data may appear in a satellite if it will later be presented orally or as a poster at the congress. Without that rule, a sponsor could pre-empt the scientific session.
Control promotion and hospitality
Most complaints from delegates start with promotion, not with content. ESCRS allows flyers only at the company’s stand or at the symposium room entrance before the session, and no advertising for prescription medicines on symposium ads or invitations. AASLD allows one sign outside the room, one hour before the start, and bans giveaways. At WORLDSymposium, the light refreshments during late-afternoon satellites are listed among the catering included in delegates’ registration. A flyer on every seat of the plenary hall saves the sponsor one email. It costs you a complaint to the chair.
Enforce the boundary outside the venue
Rules lose their force if a company can simply rent the hotel ballroom next door. EPA strictly prohibits satellites at off-site venues. ESCRS bars companies that hold a symposium outside the venue or the official schedule from its next two congresses. The European Respiratory Society (ERS) goes furthest: during the congress and for three days either side, it does not permit sponsored meetings or scientific symposia outside its own programme in the host city.
Your sponsors bring their own rulebooks too. The Conference Vetting System of MedTech Europe issues a binding decision on whether member companies may support a congress through educational grants, booths or satellite symposia (EthicalMedTech). Events must be submitted no later than 50 days before they start, and late submissions are not assessed (MedTech Europe, 2023). If your congress has not passed that assessment, a medtech company may be unable to buy a satellite at all. ESCRS also points its sponsors to the codes of EFPIA (European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations), the ABPI (Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry) and the ABHI (Association of British HealthTech Industries). The same gate applies to one-to-one meetings between partners and members, which we cover in our guide to industry partner meetings at association congresses. And because the committee that selects abstracts also guards these rules, define its remit early, as described in our guide to the conference programme committee.
Accredited or not: decide which side of the line
One decision shapes all the others: does the satellite carry credits? The table above shows two models.
In the first, common at US congresses, the satellite itself is accredited. At ASH, the ACCME-accredited provider is responsible for content quality and scientific integrity, and a commercial supporter funds the session but cannot act as organiser or provider.
In the second, the satellite sits outside the congress’s credit offering and says so, as INS 2026 does. At European medical congresses accredited by the EACCME (European Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education), this follows from the accreditor’s position: it does not consider events for accreditation where content, format or faculty is influenced by industry, and it requires the scientific content to be clearly separated from the commercial component (EACCME, General information).
Decide on which side of the line each satellite sits, and label it accordingly. A satellite that is neither clearly accredited nor clearly outside is a problem for both sides. How you get your own programme accredited, from deadlines to credit tracking, is the subject of our guide to CPD and CME accreditation for conferences.
Attendance, seats and partner meetings around the satellites
Separation does not end with the label. ASH asks for a final attendance count after its satellites and re-invoices when more people attend than estimated. Sponsors want to know how many delegates came, delegates want a seat at the buffet session and you want the satellite queue to clear before the next scientific session. All three depend on registration and check-in per session.
Solution: In Converve’s programme module, satellites sit in the agenda next to the scientific sessions, so delegates find them in the event app, and reports give you the figures from registration. Partners who would rather have one-to-one conversations than an audience can meet members in time slots you set aside for them, with rules you define in a configurable meeting matrix. If you need seat limits or check-in for individual satellites, talk to us about how that can be set up for your congress.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a satellite symposium?
A satellite symposium is a session organised and funded by a company, or by a medical education company on its behalf, that takes place during a congress in an official slot but outside the scientific programme. It is labelled as not being part of the official programme. The format is most common at medical congresses.
What is the difference between a satellite symposium and a symposium in the scientific programme?
In the scientific programme, the congress’s committee chooses the topic and the speakers. In a satellite symposium, the company or its education partner does, within the congress’s rules. Congresses such as EPA 2026 still review and approve the satellite programme, and many require a disclaimer that the session is not part of the official programme.
Are satellite symposia CME accredited?
Some are. ASH and AASLD require their satellites to offer CME through an ACCME-accredited provider (ASH, AASLD, 2026), while ENDO 2027 and WORLDSymposium 2027 leave it optional. Many congresses label industry sessions as not included in their CME or CPD credit offering, as INS 2026 does. Check the congress guidelines for each case.
How much does a satellite symposium cost?
Published fees range widely. AIDS 2026 charged between 8,600 and 61,100 USD depending on room, slot and type of organisation (IAS, 2026). AASLD charges 65,000 USD for a 90-minute lunch slot in 2026, ENDO 2027 charges 75,000 USD for a two-hour slot and ASH charges 125,500 to 161,000 USD for its Friday satellites, depending on audience size (ASH, 2026). Catering and extra audiovisual equipment are often charged on top.
When do satellite symposia take place?
Usually when the scientific programme pauses: early in the morning, at lunch or in the evening, or on a day before the congress opens. ENDO 2027 offers breakfast and evening slots only, AASLD offers lunch and dinner slots outside programme hours and ASH runs its satellites on the Friday before the annual meeting.
Who is responsible for the content of a satellite symposium?
The organising company or its accredited education provider. At ASH, the accredited provider is responsible for content quality and scientific integrity, and at ENDO 2027 the medical education company is responsible for faculty, content and outcomes. The congress sets the rules and can refuse content, but it does not author the session.
Conclusion: sell the boundary with the slot
A satellite symposium is worth its fee because delegates trust the programme it stands beside. Every rule in this guide protects that trust: slots in the gaps of the programme, a clear allocation rule, a fixed disclaimer, a content review, limits on promotion and a clear decision on credits. Treat these rules as part of the package you sell, and the chair of your scientific committee will defend the satellites instead of fighting them.
If your society wants to see how programme, registration and partner meetings work together at a congress, our page for associations gives an overview. Planning satellites for your next congress? Get in touch with Converve.
