Tours & activities in Asia: A golden opportunity
For many in the World, Asia represents the exotic. The jungles and resorts of South-east Asia, elephant trekking through India and Thailand, river cruises along the Mekong, these are experiences that can only be found in Asia. The unique, the once in the lifetime, and the seemingly difficult to book [...]
Tackling multi-modal search in Asia
How important is multi-modal search in the Asian travel marketplace? That’s a question we’ve been hearing more often lately, as partners who are integrating Rome2rio into their European sites consider the implications for other markets.Pictured left: Rod CuthbertTo better understand the potent [...]
Travelport launches its Universal API in Asia
Travelport today launches its ground-breaking Travelport Universal API™ (Application Programming Interface) to developers in Asia.Now available in over 90 countries, Travelport uAPI is the first API that aggregates content from the GDS (air, car and hotel), high speed rail suppliers, low cost car [...]
TripAdvisor Connect gives small hotels the edge, makes it ‘credible alternative’ to OTAs
More than 210 Internet booking engines have signed up in anticipation of what TripAdvisor calls its game-changing online platform, TripAdvisor Connect, scheduled to launch later this year.(Pictured, Nikoi, an example of a small, independent resort in Bintan that would benefit from the new service) [...]
The Wrap: Malaysia Airlines expands its Asian footprint
In the news: Airlines take the limelight this week.Malaysia Airlines strengthens its Asian footprints Malaysia’s national carrier, Malaysia Airlines, is in an expansion mode, ramping up capacity and frequencies to Singapore, Bandar Seri Begawan, Medan, Sydney and Melbourne, while putting Darwin b [...]
Meet the start-up that wants to be the “Expedia” of bus travel in ASEAN
One gave up a high-paying job in a multinational, the other left a family business. Together, Ashwin Jeyapalasingam and Viren Doshi launched a start-up, CatchThatBus, to do exactly that – help travellers in South-east Asia catch that bus online.Ashwin Jeyapalasingam, COO (pictured left in photo), [...]
Tours and activities player FlexTrip acquired by Nor1
Congratulations to FlexTrip, one of our WIT Start-Up alumni, for being acquired by Nor1, Inc. the technology leader in upsell solutions – and really it’s a nod to the growing interest in the tours and activities space.Founded in 2011, Flextrip, based in Boulder, Colorado, enables travel compa [...]
HotelQuickly gets HK$9mil in fresh funding
Same-day hotel booking mobile app, HotelQuickly, is set to expand further within the region and accelerate product development after closing series A round funding of HK$9 million (US$1.15 million).Financial backers consist of angel investors from three continents, including Boon Hwee Koh, former c [...]
Luxury travel hotspots shifting eastward to Asia; Millennials redefine luxury as “Instagram-able” experiences
At Brand Karma, we’re fascinated by what social media can tell us about the future of travel. We’ve just produced a report called "The Luxury Traveller & Social Media: The Americas" in partnership with the International Luxury Travel Market, which aims to understand the preferences of luxu [...]
Chinese travellers looking at new destinations beyond traditional playgrounds
Hong Kong and Macau are currently the main draws for mainland Chinese travellers due to their many attractions, but there is a shift in travel trend to destinations within Asia and further afield for holiday breaks, says TripAdvisor.
In the travel site’s recently released list of the top 20 mo [...]
