Marketing
DayAway may be built in Covid times but founder Martha Waslen says it will last long beyond pandemic
21/04/2021 by Tabbi Maitland
“Not just another OTA” as local experiences platform rolls out to help hotels sell ancillaries IF  you haven’t heard of DayAway, you may soon. Within five minutes of meeting Martha Waslen, founder of the Singapore-based local experiences startup, two things are clear. One, that she do [...]
Guest Post: Runway to a smart, sustainable and safe restart
20/04/2021 by WiT
The trans-Tasman travel bubble opened on 19 April, fuelling hopes of more borders opening and hastening travel recovery. Subhas Menon, director general of the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines (AAPA), shares his views on travel bubbles and how the Asia Pacific aviation industry can restart in a [...]
Latest wave dampens Phuket’s hopes of reopening; Trisara stays on course of wellness and mindfulness
20/04/2021 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
LIKE other hotels in Phuket, the award-winning luxury resort Trisara had been looking forward to closing April on a healthy note because domestic travel in Thailand had been gathering steam but then, came the third wave of infections, the largest outbreak in the country since last March. Said Ki [...]
25 years on, Expedia flips “green screen” again to become the traveller’s companion
19/04/2021 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
“It matters who you travel with” falls on shoulders of new brand custodian, Shiv Singh SHIV Singh, the new senior vice president and general manager of Brand Expedia, was sitting in front of an impressively-stacked bookcase when I spoke to him on Zoom. I had to ask, “Is that fake or are th [...]
Covid has tested global-local models in travel, says KKday’s Liu
19/04/2021 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
“Curated experiences” marketplace embeds deeper local roots, launches Fine Day for luxury and scales Rezio WHEN Weichun Liu told her parents she was giving up investment banking to join KKday in 2016, they thought she was joining KKBox, the “Spotify of Taiwan”. “I didn’t want to tell [...]
Cleartrip sale to Flipkart inevitable, as Covid crushes travel and marketplaces seize moment to enter vertical
16/04/2021 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
IN many ways, the proposed acquisition of Cleartrip by Flipkart, known as the “Amazon of India” was inevitable – inevitable because the pandemic has no doubt devastated the 15-year-old company’s India business, leaving it vulnerable, and inevitable because of the ambitions of e-commerce mar [...]
Dubai vs Singapore – what happened to hotel reviews during Covid?
16/04/2021 by WiT
THERE is a generally held belief that local guests are more demanding than foreign guests, which would affect the way they review hotels. WiT asked TrustYou to test this hypothesis. The way in which the Covid-19 pandemic has impacted hospitality and travel happened through both a global and a l [...]
The Wrap: Saudia partners IATA to test Travel Pass, Narita Airport pilots biometric boarding process, and more …
15/04/2021 by WiT
THE Wrap is a round-up of news in the travel and technology industries, and to keep track of developments in these sectors as businesses adapt and reset to meet challenges in the era of coronavirus. Saudia introduces IATA Travel Pass on Kuala Lumpur to Jeddah flights On successful trial of th [...]
What Travelport+ means to an OTA or TMC
13/04/2021 by WiT
What does the launch of Travelport+ mean in practical terms to an OTA or TMC? We posed a few questions. Q: Will a customer (say TMC or OTA) be able to create their own UX solution on top of the new Travelport+ microservice layer? Absolutely. Our new JSON/RESTful APIs create the kind of develo [...]
Webb: Recovery won’t be online vs offline, it will be driven by policy
13/04/2021 by Yeoh Siew Hoon
Travelport doubles down on tech to simplify next gen retailing for recovery FOR Greg Webb, CEO of Travelport, pushing ahead with its next generation platform – a commitment it made in 2019 when it went private – was absolutely necessary despite the pandemic crushing the travel industry and a [...]