What happens when as a seven-year-old, you are moved from Okinawa to Indiana – two more contrasting places you couldn’t imagine? Well, for half-Japanese-half-American Michael Dykes, it was definitely “jarring”, but it taught him some valuable life lessons which have stood him in good stead in both his career and life.
The Vice President, Market Management of Asia Pacific for Expedia Group said growing up on a farm in rural America taught him self-sufficiency as well as an appreciation for the origin of food. It also made him determined to return to Japan, and Asia, where his heart is and so he made sure he never lost his Japanese language skills while building a new life in the US.
When the opportunity for a job in Tokyo came up, while he was working in New York, he jumped at it and a few years later, when the opportunity for a job with Expedia in Tokyo came up, he too leapt at it.
In Asia, he rediscovered his roots and in travel, he found his groove. About 18 months ago, he relocated from Tokyo to Singapore and has spent the last year-and-a-half learning about the differences between the South-east Asia region and North Asia.
In this podcast, he talks about how countries in South-east Asia are more interwoven with each other – a lot of cultural awareness across boundaries, not seen so much in North-east Asia, which then leads to e-commerce in general, including travel, cutting across boundaries as well. He compares Traveloka – which says its monthly active users is 55m – with the largest OTA in Japan, Jalan, whose published number is 13.7m.
Demographics too define the Asia story. A firm believer in demographics setting longterm trends, he says Gen Z already forms 25% of the population and with Millennials, that adds up to 50% – “it’s a huge population of people with potentially a very different set of values and a very different childhood, driving a lot of differences in the way that they will purchase and how they will make brand decisions”.
And if you extend that to the greater middle class – that’s 3.5b people in the middle class in the region, compared to the US’ 689 million – “so it’s just no question that this is the place to be, this is where we will continue to see travel innovating and growing”.
Expedia Group’s B2B business is a good example of where Asia has been leading the way, he says. “I think the thing to realise is that the B2B business, actually in many ways in APAC, we’ve been leading the way for the rest of the world … we were growing our B2B business, and a lot of that growth was actually happening in Asia Pacific.”
And beyond the partnerships it’s announced with Jetstar and Philippine Airlines, it also has a deal now with general e-commerce players such as G-Mart of South Korea. “We’re starting to look at other segments, we’re looking at other players in other places” such as corporate travel.
It’s also expanding the definition of B2B, and he sees opportunities within Asia Pacific, both vertically and geographically, for Expedia to “power travel for everybody”.
And the one word he wants to embrace for 2024 is “confidence.”
“We need to be extremely confident about the strength of this region. Everything is pointing in the right direction. By 2025, we will have the largest travel market in the world, if Phocuswright is right. Everything is moving in such a positive direction that we have to start thinking of ourselves as leading the world in travel and not just following the trends of somebody else. I would like us to have that self confidence in this part of the world.”
Listen to the full episode here:
