Posts by Yeoh Siew Hoon
Portier Technologies gains more ground with VinaPhone tie-up
10/09/2018 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
As hotels seek ways to engage their guests beyond the initial booking and the check-in, and boost ancillary earnings, startups offering hotel concierge service like Portier are gaining traction. US-based Portier Technologies, founded in 2016, just announced its latest tie-up – a partnership wit [...]
Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Even DBS Bank had a “near death” experience.
06/09/2018 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
It is said that misery loves company, so does change. Change loves, and needs, company because it is definitely less lonely when you see that everyone’s experiencing and muddling through the same set of challenges. In the past few months, I’ve seen and spoken to an array of companies grapplin [...]
Work on digital literacy to compete against aliens, magicians and barbarians, futurist Rohit Talwar urges
05/09/2018 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
In a world where “aliens, magicians and barbarians” are shaking up the world at large with their tech and tech change is happening at an exponential rate, organisations have to ensure digital literacy at every level if they are to transform successfully. Rohit Talwar, futurist and CEO of Fast [...]
How Anywhr grew out of a hate of travel and now she’s sending people to live her dream
04/09/2018 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
It started out as a lark – a travel website that would surprise Singaporeans with destination choices based on their profile and preferences – but when they got their first booking, the two co-founders found themselves scrambling to put together what they had promised. From that start a year [...]
Sean Menke pushing the limits with his own Sabre endurance race – 80 miles to go
11/09/2018 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
The toughest endurance race Sean Menke, Sabre president & CEO, has ever run is the Leadville Trail 100, a 100-mile race in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, which you have to be complete in 30 hours. It has an elevation gain of 5,000 metres and you do it without oxygen and sleep. He completed [...]
Stop thinking in verticals, says Menke as Sabre sets out to become platform at the centre of travel
30/08/2018 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
To travellers, a trip is a connected journey – we grab a ride to the airport, fly, arrive, grab ride to hotel, hopefully have a lovely stay and if we have time, book a couple of activities (or should we say experiences these days), depart hotel for airport, and the loop continues. The travel in [...]
Round two of “Passion Made Possible” pushes envelope with tales of locals who defied the norm to do their thing
29/08/2018 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
Meet Cai Yinzhou whose parents kept asking him to get a fulltime job but all he wanted to do was share his Geylang neighbourhood with travellers. He turned his passion into Geylang Adventures, which takes visitors through the back alleys of Singapore’s red light district. (Watch his video here) [...]
Hand lettering in the heartland, and why boredom can be a good thing
30/08/2018 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
“I can’t remember the last time I concentrated so long at doing one thing,” said Parin Mehta, director, global experiences, operations, Airbnb, his head bent low as he painstakingly wrote on a piece of paper. “Ya, me too,” I agreed, my head bent equally low over the task at hand. Par [...]
Prashant Kirtane out to make Travelstop unstoppable as agent of change in unmanaged corporate travel in Asia
27/08/2018 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
Three years after the sale of Travelmob to HomeAway, co-founder Prashant Kirtane has launched his new startup, Travelstop, to become the “Slack of unmanaged corporate travel” for SMEs in Asia. The startup, aimed at solving pain points from booking to expense management to providing data insig [...]
Everyone wants to be an Experience Maker – lessons from Coca-Cola and ONE Championship
23/08/2018 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
It seems everyone wants to be in the experience business these days, whether you’re selling bottles of sugared water, body lotion, education or sports. At the Adobe Symposium, held in Singapore this week, they call themselves experience makers. As I listened to speaker after speaker talk about [...]