Maggie Rauch, senior research analyst, PhoCusWright, was at today’s Bootcamp held in conjunction with WIT Japan and she came away impressed. Here’s her account.
The pitch by Anchor Up
Today’s competitors at WIT Japan’s Start-Up Pitch, held as part of the Bootcamp, were impressively bold, creative, and well prepared to present and defend their business models to a small brain trust of Asian online travel experts.
Most were presenting consumer-facing apps, with offerings ranging from gamified local discovery (Anchor Up) to hotel metasearch for Korea’s online travel market (AllStay) to ways to meet locals (Lifull) or stay with them (Hyakusen–Renma).
Watch out, Viator – the theme of in-destination activities was a hot one. And watch out, Google Maps – Korea’s Dabeeo is not afraid to come after you with its personalised, traveller-optimised mapping technology.
One presenter went after a travel sector that does not get much attention from start-ups — event space matching site Space Market.
Noticeably absent? Ground transportation start-ups, which have been all the rage globally.
The pitch by AllStay
The biggest funding rounds in this space in APAC have come out of China, Singapore and India. None of today’s companies were pursuing a similar venture in Korea, Japan or China.
Also not heard so much were the themes of personalisation and data that have become such drumbeats in online travel. It could be that those themes just didn’t make it into presentations, or companies have not refined their strategies.
Altogether, a fascinating and inspiring first day at my first WIT event. I enjoyed soaking up the entrepreneurial spirit and look forward to more tomorrow.
