Travelport expands Japan’s presence with acquisition of Galileo Japan
Leading travel commerce platform, Travelport, has acquired Galileo Japan, its third party distributor in the country.Galileo Japan was previously owned by a consortium of airline owners.With the acquisition Travelport will build a new, consolidated Travelport Japan entity that will continue to offer [...]
The Millennial Traveller: To earn customer love, hoteliers have to be modern-day Casanovas
Traditionally, customer loyalty could be gained by a simple reward structure, trading in loyalty points for free nights like a kid trading in his arcade game tokens for the large teddy bear from the kiosk.Now, with digital players like OTAs and meta-searches commoditising hotel rates, hoteliers need [...]
AccorHotels buys onefinestay, plans to add 40 new markets
Adding to its arsenal in private accommodation, Accor Hotels has acquired onefinestay, a high-end hospitality pioneer specialising in luxury serviced home rental in key worldwide gateways.The acquisition is for €148M (£117M) and AccorHotels has made a further commitment of €64m (£50m) to help [...]
KLM expands social media strategy with launch of Facebook Messenger service
KLM Royal Dutch Airlines has partnered with Facebook Messenger to launch a service that allow travellers to check-in, access boarding pass and receive flight status updates through the app.This makes KLM the first global airline to provide these services on Messenger.The new partnership makes it eas [...]
How Contiki keeps itself fresh for today’s millennials
Contiki has been specialising in the business of group travel for 18 to 35 year olds since 1962, well before the advent of the current generation of young travellers. This travel company may be 54 years old, but it still knows how to get down with the kids.The firm does more than dabble in social me [...]
“Safe travels” is the greeting for the new normal
Over dinner in Bangkok, while drooling over the best crab angel hair pasta ever at Il Bolognese, our conversation inevitably moved to travel. The three of us, all working in the travel industry, had flown in from different places, one from Taipei, one from India and myself from Singapore via Hong Ko [...]
The Wrap: Historic Central Market goes online to reach a wider audience
In the news: KL Central Market’s MoU with 11street, new baggage tracing solution from Lufthansa and SITA, Hop Inn and FASTBOOKING partnerHistoric Central Market goes online to reach a wider audienceCentral Market, one of the most popular attractions in the Malaysian capital city of Kuala Lumpur, h [...]
By all means, pursue direct but learn to milk those distribution partnerships
No hotel is an island, especially in distribution, and once you accept that fact then the wisest approach to take is to then find the right distributors who can give you the most value.That was the general consensus of hoteliers speaking at WIT Hospitality. Puneet Mahindroo, corporate director of re [...]
The “brutally simple” world of Mandarin Oriental and Hobson’s views on digital
In a world of constant, rapid change, Hong Kong-based Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group has managed to stay on course with a quality and consistent approach to brand building, product, service delivery and guest experience.The consistency in messaging is clearly helped by the fact that the chief marketi [...]
Hotel ICON differentiates with “laboratory” approach and content
As hotels become more commoditised through price-led distribution, it is even more essential to differentiate and general manager of Hotel ICON, Richard Hatter, spoke about how the hotel’s positioning as a “laboratory” has stood it well in a competitive market like Hong Kong.Speaking at the WI [...]
