In the news: Amadeus acquires Newmarket, Maldives’ fastest growing destination out of Singapore,  London most reviewed city on TripAdvisor, surge in user generated reviews on Hotel.jp

Amadeus accelerates move into hotel IT sector with acquisition of Newmarket

As part of its strategy to diversify into new business areas, Amadeus has acquired Newmarket International, a cloud-based group and event IT solutions for the hotel industry, for US$500 million

Known for its airline IT business and distribution services for travel agencies, Amadeus said the deal would strengthen its presence in the hotel IT market and commitment to the sector.

Newmarket, based in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, has 430 employees globally. The entire team and management will join the Amadeus Global Hotel Group when the transaction closes in the first quarter of 2014.

Amadeus also plans to integrate Newmarket’s cloud-based solutions into those currently offered by the Amadeus Global Hotel Group.

Newmarket, which serves around 22,000 properties in 154 countries, operates in the group and event management segment of the hotel industry that is estimated to account for 30-40% of a full-service hotel’s revenues. In 2013 the company had US$110 million in estimated revenue, and an EBITDA margin of 31%.

Amadeus said Newmarket is a growing, profitable and cash-generative business that will be earnings accretive to Amadeus from day one

“This important and strategic acquisition will strengthen Amadeus’ position in the hotel IT sector, bringing important expertise and key customer relationships to the company that will accelerate our move into this key market,” said Luis Maroto, President and CEO of Amadeus. “With many hotel chains at a crossroads in their IT strategy, and the provider landscape fragmented, Amadeus is committed to playing a key role in partnering with the hotel industry to address its challenges and this transaction will greatly accelerate that objective.”

• Image courtesy of Newcastle International (from its official website)

Maldives is flavour of the year for travellers out of Singapore

Flight searches made on Skyscanner.com.sg this year showed that demand for air travel to Maldives (pictured left) has increased by 94% compared to 2012, making it fastest growing destination from the island republic this year.

Skyscanner, in its annual travel trends report, also revealed that South Korea came in second with demand growing by 79% year-on-year. The Czech Republic (+55%), Brunei (+49%) and Taiwan (+37%) make up the top five fastest growing destinations by search volume.

Thailand once again reigned supreme as the most popular travel destinations for Singaporeans, followed by China, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines.

Singaporeans’ favourite cities for travel in 2013 are Bangkok, Hong Kong, Taipei, Seoul and Bali (Denpasar).

“The emerging destinations on our list this year are an intriguing mix of Asia Pacific, Europe and the Middle East. It’s particularly interesting to see four European destinations in the top 10 fastest growing destination searches on our site, suggesting that Singaporeans are travelling further than ever,” said Skyscanner marketing manager for Southeast Asia, Janet Ranola, said.

Around 20% of Skyscanner’s 25 million monthly unique visitors now come from the Asia Pacific region with millions of flight searches performed worldwide on its site and mobile apps each year.

10 fastest growing destinations from Singapore in 2013

1. Maldives +94%
2. South Korea +79%
3. Czech Republic +55%
4. Brunei +49%
5. Taiwan +37%
6. Switzerland +35%
7. Japan + 32%
8. New Zealand +27%
9. Brazil +26%
10. UAE +28%

• Photo credit: Luiz Rocha/Shutterstock.com

London’s most reviewed city on TripAdvisor

London tops the list of cities that received most reviews worldwide in 2013 inTripAdivsor’s Top 10 Reviewed Cities, with Rome, Paris, New York City and Las Vegas making up the top five.

Singapore is the country with “Most to Say” and “Most Trips Abroad” under the most prolific content contributors of the year. It also came in second with most number of photos contributed, after Japan.

The United States is the top contributing country with the most content contributed overall. It is followed by Japan with most photos submitted per member on average, Singapore with highest average number of characters per review, and Belgium with themost helpful votes received per member on average. Rounding up this list is Singapore with the highest percentage of reviews written about travel outside home country.

The findings are based on the reviews and opinions submitted to the travel site from its community of millions of travellers worldwide.

Here’s the infographic showing the world’s most prolific contributors by country.

Hotel.jp sees surge in user generated reviews

The total number of user-generated reviews (including those with photos and videos) on Hotel.jp, part of Tokyo based Venture Republic, surpassed 300,000 in November 2013, a 60% increase year-on-year and a 480% increase since 2011.

The positive result was mainly due to the robust growth in hotel bookings made over the internet on devices like tablets and smartphones, said the company. These review are also becoming important to people’s hotel booking decisions, said the company.

Hotel.jp, one of Japan’s largest hotel review sites, has also managed to double its traffic (and more than triple its traffic via smartphones) in the past year. More and more of its new users are also looking at reviews generated by other users, or posting their own reviews.

Venture Republic’s CEO, Kei Shibata, said that today the influence of online reviews on how users choose a hotel is bigger than ever.