How many giants can Asia hold? Agoda’s Teja and Trip.com’s Xie on competition, expansion and making sense of new tech
Calling Trip.com Group and Agoda ‘industry giants’ would certainly be an understatement. Both companies have expanded rapidly over the last few years, dominating regional demographics and adding more verticals to their platforms while becoming one-stop booking shops for many travellers in the re [...]
Blog | Note to self: Create uplifting conferences like WiT Indie
WiT Indie is the Web In Travel edition for independent travel champions, curators, movers and shakers. Strong conviction, clear vision, persistent (almost stubborn) action to make ideas happen. I left the event exhausted, but also awed, inspired, uplifted.
Notes I took down:
On tourism experie [...]
Travel as a “memory industry” driven by tech advancements
The experts came together at Phocuswright Europe to talk about travel tech trends around the world, things like generative artificial intelligence, machine learning and the metaverse.
So, it might have seemed jarring when one of the panelists on Center Stage defined travel in terms that evoke pho [...]
The impact of visa-free travel on ASEAN this summer, and how travel brands can capitalise
While visa-free access removes one barrier, other factors such as marketing efforts, infrastructure, and overall destination appeal are crucial in attracting tourists, says expert.
According to the UNWTO World Tourism Barometer, the recovery of international tourism fell short of expectat [...]
Letter from Burrator: A slice of Sarawak in Dartmoor, and where AI does not mean what we think it does
As my friend and I were walking down a quiet country lane in Sheepstor, in West Dartmoor, England, a man stopped and asked us, “Would you two ladies happen to be from Sarawak?”
We smiled and said, “No, but we are from Malaysia.”
Listen to the article here:
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Possibilities and responsibilities of travel in the age of Generative AI
The WiT Japan & North Asia Travel Tech Thinktank 2024, sponsored by EY, explored the evolving role of AI and tech in travel.
Building on the Global Travel Tech Thinktank in Singapore in October 2023, the Tokyo event gathered industry leaders to discuss AI's impact on talent, product innovation, [...]
Letter from Barcelona: Of prohibited works and the art of balancing local interests with tourism
The day before I arrived in Barcelona, apparently thousands of Spanish had taken to the streets in the city as well as in the islands to protest against mass tourism and overcrowding.
Reports said that “up to 3,000 young people marched in Barcelona on June 8, chanting “Tourists go home” and [...]
Viator’s origin story – A tale of a prince and a girl from Tasmania
Rod Cuthbert, the founder of Viator, doesn't claim to have had the idea for the tours and activities business. It originally came from a contract with Sabre back in the late '90s when the idea of selling tours and activities, via the travel agency community, appealed to the distribution company.
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Neuroscience to AI: How Shiyi Pickrell is helping Expedia connect the dots in a data-driven landscape
“I started learning how the brain works, now I am teaching machine learning models to mimic what the brain can do, but on a much faster and bigger scale."
It might sound like a leap at first, but the more you think about the similarities between neuroscience and Artificial Intelligence, the more [...]
Key trends to heed in “Next Generation” of travel in APAC
As we enter the next generation of travel in Asia Pacific, here are the key trends to watch – from the revolution in B2B, to transformation of the human-machine interface and changing demographics with all the inherent changes in customer behaviour to come. It’s a summary of the thoughts and ide [...]
