Letter from Sydney: Loh Lik Peng on the four-year making of the Old Clare Hotel
Loh Lik Peng's latest project, the Old Clare Hotel Sydney, is due to open end of this month. No one is more relieved than he to see the finish line in sight of this four-year restoration project. The day I was at the construction site of the Old Clare Hotel Sydney, workmen were bringing in, to my [...]
Expedia’s De Schepper wants hoteliers to see OTAs in a new light
Mieke De Schepper wants to help hoteliers in APAC see the light, as it were, regarding the true value of distribution via OTAs. The vice president, Market Management, Asia Pacific, Expedia® Lodging Partner Services, who joined Expedia after a long career with Philips, where she was responsible for [...]
How “tough little” Joyce turned Qantas around; next to hit that sweet spot in loyalty, big data
What I like about Australia is how they call a spade a spade and if they could, they’d abbreviate it (and they probably have) and so when Peter Harbison, executive chairman of CAPA (Centre For Aviation) called Alan Joyce a “tough little bugger” on stage, I wasn’t too surprised.In fact, if I [...]
Mom & pops the real fuel behind the Vietnamese boom
As with most of emerging Asia, the smartphone is transforming Vietnam’s travel market. Digital entrepreneur and marketing specialist Simon Christy, founder and CEO, of VEO Media, started Alehap.vn, a social travel platform, back in 2009 and has since the changes since the beginning. He talks to WI [...]
Letter from Penang: Hack of a thing to do on a Saturday night
It wasn’t what I was expecting to do on a Saturday night in Penang, but I ended up listening to three teams of developers presenting their start-up ideas at a very impromptu hackathon.That I was doing this in a pre-war Chinese shophouse in the heart of the Georgetown World Heritage precinct made i [...]
Game-changer in the making? Ascott teams up with Tujia, CapitaLand gets serious about IT
The private accommodation and real estate market in China and Asia just got a whole lot more interesting with the latest move by Singapore-based CapitaLand to invest in and form a joint venture with Tujia.com, Beijing-based apartment sharing site.CapitaLand is one of Asia’s largest real estate com [...]
The murky world of e-commerce and what happens when credit card fraud strikes you
Last month, I noticed a transaction on my Citibank Visa credit card that I didn’t recall making. It was for an event software solution so it was probable I could have made it, but on checking out the vendor’s website, I knew I hadn’t. I had never heard of it. I then went over my statements mo [...]
Corporate travel in disruption: Concur’s news at GBTA part of change sweeping the sector
From a partnership with Lufthansa that will enable business travelers to book direct on LH.com to one with services like Lfyt and HotelTonight, Concur's announcements made at this week's Global Business Travel Associatoon (GBTA) Convention in Orlando are all part of changes sweeping the lucrative co [...]
Our future depends on being relevant in Asia, say Expedia’s new leaders
Under new leadership and housed in plush new offices, Expedia Inc has moved to underscore its commitment to the region with industry gatherings in Bangkok and last week, in Singapore.At the Singapore event, attended by close to 100 hoteliers, the leadership team, led by interim CEO Jonty Neal and Mi [...]
WIT Warrior Spotlight: Kei Shibata wants to use content and price to change the way travellers make decisions
At the WIT Conference last year in Singapore, we recognised 11 individuals whom we felt have had the most influence on the development of online travel in Asia Pacific. This is the seventh article in a series of interviews profiling the WIT Warriors.Kei Shibata is a pioneer of travel meta-search in [...]
