WORLDHOTELS soars first quarter, scoops Hotel Fort Canning
On the back of strong sales in the first four months of the year, WORLDHOTELS also announced its fourth hotel in Singapore – Hotel Fort Canning, Singapore’s first boutique heritage hotel set in a park. The 86-room hotel, due to open August, has been pursued by several marketing and reservations [...]
Wanted: Standards to support shopping, ancillary services, across channels
The industry’s leading travel management companies, online agencies, and global distribution systems (GDSs) today announced their support for plans to implement recently developed, industry-wide technology standards which enable shopping, booking, payment, and reporting of ancillary services. Th [...]
Natural Search, Google and all that, Part 1
I have long believed that the Achilles Heel of the travel industry was its insistence that search and shopping for product required too much of the user.The EXPLICIT nature of a dumb search in travel contrasted – badly - with a conventional search in both web search and regular human interaction, [...]
Sound of Data equals ancillary revenues
What does data sound like? Well, to one company, The Sound of Data represents opportunities for players such as online travel agencies and travel management companies to earn money in ancillary services such as SMS flight notification alerts to customers.The Netherlands-based company, which describe [...]
Want to be a hosted buyer? Register now
Registration is now open for hosted buyers to ITB Asia 2010.Hosted buyers will have the opportunity to meet over 700 international exhibitions in one location, source for new destinations, travel products and services, learn and network with industry peers and take advantage of seminars and work [...]
Tipping point in hotel bookings, Amadeus also reports strong airline data
Two sets of figures from Pegasus View and Amadeus confirm an industry on the mend.The March edition of The Pegasus View from Pegasus Solutions indicates a tipping point in booking confidence, especially in business travel. Based on data drawn from billions of global distribution system (GDS) and alt [...]
Lessons on the road
There's no better education than travel and lessons can come late or early in life, as Yeoh Siew Hoon found out at last week's WIT*e. What’s a sure sign that it’s a good party? When people don’t want to leave …Well, at last week’s WIT*e – Inspiration & Mentoring held at the Fairmont [...]
C-Spotting with WIT: Customer Moment #1
In line with the WIT Conference 2010 theme, “The C-Spot”, WIT shares a customer moment.May 4, 2010 – lunchtime at Mezza9, Grand Hyatt, SingaporeI am with Hans Lerch, CEO of Hotelplan, Switzerland, who is staying inhouse. It’s 12.45pm, Hans is clearly in a hurry as he has another appointment [...]
Bangkok’s pain is Bali’s gain
The political unrest in Bangkok has proved to be a boon for Indonesia with travel demand shifting to alternative locations such as Bali and Jakarta, said Robbie Cooke, CEO and managing director of Wotif Group, which opened its fifth Asian office in Bali this week.Cooke said the group has seen steady [...]
How the virtual “check-in” could Impact travel
Steven Gong of Circos Brand Karma writes about how location-based social networks such as Foursquare could influence the hospitality industry.Location-based social networks are currently the hottest topic in tech industry, with the first wave of early adopters already beginning to influence the rest [...]
