WiT Seoul 2020, to be held October 29, will combine a physical WiT Innovation Stage in Seoul starting at 2pm local time, with a virtual Main Stage which will kick off at 5pm.
The WiT innovation Stage, aimed at connecting local startups with investors in mentoring sessions, will be held from 2pm-4.30pm, at Courtyard by Marriott Seoul Namdaemun, Hanyang Hall. The winner of the WiT Seoul Startup Pitch, Capsule, which was crowned during the recent WiT Experience Week will be featured during the event.
“In line with local restrictions around events in Seoul, we will be having a small event – around 30 people – and the aim is to encourage local startups during these challenging times,” said Min Yoon, co-founder of WiT Seoul, and CEO of Tidesquare.
“We are seeing pretty interesting developments in the startup space, and we want to use WiT to create an ecosystem for the Korean travel startup scene because we have seen the value having a community can do for innovation and entrepreneurship.”
Following the physical event, WiT Virtual Seoul will be held from 5pm and will feature a cast of speakers from the president of Korean Air, Kee-Hong Woo, to regional travel leaders such as Louise Daley, Deputy CEO, Accor Asia Pacific, Ang Choo Pin, Senior Director, Government & Corporate Affairs, & Managing Director Asia, Expedia Group, Ooi Chee Teong (CT), Senior Director, International Flight Business, Trip.com and Timothy Hughes,Vice President Corporate Development, Agoda.
Steve Saxon, Expert Partner of McKinsey & Company, will give an overview of “What Travel Recovery Will Look Like for Asia”.
To share trends happening in the Korean travel market, Donggun Lee, CEO & co-founder, MyRealTrip, will share the screen with James Lee, General Manager, South Korea, Klook and Jun Shin, Chief Strategy Officer, Tidesquare.
“The Korean market has shown remarkable resilience,” said Yeoh Siew Hoon, founder, WiT. “It was one of the first to show green shoots of recovery but as we have seen with Covid, it’s been pretty much up and down but still the Korean domestic travel market has been powering on steadily.
“This period has also seen acceleration in technology adoption by the industry and it will be interesting to get an update from a market that was Asia’s second biggest outbound market pre-Covid. This is a population with a very robust travel appetite, 28m outbound travellers in 2019, and we can expect that once this pandemic blows over, they will be back exploring the world again. And you can bet, their buying behaviour will certainly have changed over this period.”
