TOURISM New Zealand has decided to base its newly appointed regional manager South-east Asia and India in Singapore, in a bid to enhance existing partnerships with airlines and travel trade partners in the region.

Mischa Mannix, currently Tourism New Zealand business development manager based in Auckland, will replace Kiran Nambiar, the former incumbent based in Mumbai, in December.

Staff at the NTO’s offices in Mumbai and Bangkok will report to Mannix.

Mark Frood, general manager Asia Markets, Tourism New Zealand, said the NTO’s decision to move its regional manager to Singapore “was not a strategic one”.

“More airlines, including low-cost carriers, now offer flights and greater capacity to New Zealand from India and South-east Asia. We thought that it was the right time to centralise our marketing activities (for South-east Asia and India) in Singapore, which is the region’s prime aviation hub, alongside Bangkok,” he explained.

“It was the most sensible course of action to take, as we wanted to be closer to both our trade and airline partners.”

The NTO is looking to expand the team in Singapore before long, with a marketing & communications hire the first priority.

Meanwhile, Tourism New Zealand is in the midst of carving out its marketing plan for 2012-13.

While Frood declined to elaborate on future plans, he did reveal that the NTO would focus on marketing its niche products, such as wine, gastronomy, boat trips and self-drive tours, to South-east Asians and Indians in the coming year.

According to Frood, visitor arrivals from India and Malaysia are growing strongly, while the Singapore market, which was flat a few years before, is starting to pick up again.

OUTRIGGER Hotels and Resorts will manage the Phi Phi Island Village Beach Resort & Spa as its third hotel property in Thailand.

The resort will continue to operate under its current name until November 1 next year, when it will be rebranded as Outrigger Phi Phi Island Resort & Spa.

Outrigger has already assumed full sales & marketing functions at the resort, which currently offers 112 villas, four restaurants, two bars, a spa, a fitness centre, and a dive and activity centre.

A US$1.7 million refurbishment will take place before the rebranding, with thirty-eight new villas to be added to the property.

SHANGHAI-based DMCs who have been complaining for the longest time about the lack of large venues in downtown Puxi, will welcome the new Sofitel that will open on West Beijing Road by end-2012.

The Sofitel Shanghai Jing An Huamin, located a short walk away from the main shopping thoroughfare of West Nanjing Road, will have six meeting rooms, and a 1,310m2 grand ballroom with capacity for up to 760 pax banquet-style or 1,500 pax cocktail-style.

Most ballrooms in downtown hotels, in comparison, seat below 500 pax.

Sofitel Shanghai Jing An Huamin’s director of sales & marketing, Andrew Hartley, said: “Already, I have serious interest coming from groups and incentives.”

Besides the MICE facilities, the property will also feature three restaurants and two bars, an indoor heated swimming pool, and a fitness centre.

There will be 503 guestrooms at the hotel, including 74 junior/prestige suites and one imperial suite. The minimum room size will be 45m2.

By Patricia Wee

SEVERAL Thai carriers have had to make adjustments to their operations in Bangkok as a result of prolonged flooding in some parts of the capital.

Nok Air will continue to operate its flights to 15 domestic destinations out of Suvarnabhumi Airport till January 31. The budget carrier previously relocated to Suvarnabhumi from its hub at Don Muang Airport (TTG Asia e-Daily, October 25), which remains closed due to the floods.

Thai Airways International (THAI) and Bangkok Airways have also been affected, with both carriers having to relocate their head office operations owing to severe flooding on Vibhavadi-Rangsit Road—with water levels reportedly reaching up to 90cm this morning.

THAI transferred ticketing services to its Larn Luang, Silom and Suvarnabhumi Airport branches, while Bangkok Airways’ moved its ticketing services to Suvarnabhumi.

Both airlines continue to operate daily flights to and from Suvarnabhumi Airport.

Meanwhile, with reports coming in that Rama II Road – the main highway from Bangkok to the country’s south – might become inundated by floods, THAI has decided to launch a Southern Thailand Flood Relief special fare.

The tactical offers 47-58 per cent off regular ticket prices on the flag carrier’s routes to Surat Thani, Krabi, Phuket, Hat Yai and Koh Samui, valid for travel from today till December 10.

PHOENIX Tours International became Taiwan’s first travel consultancy to be publicly traded when it was listed on the Taiex stock exchange last month.

For Phoenix’s president, Antonio Liao, it was a long-awaited move. “We heard that Star Travel (another Taipei-based outfit) submitted its application for the over-the-counter market, so we had to run a little faster,” he said.

In Taiwan, equities are traded on two boards. The over-the-counter market has a minimum capital requirement of NT$50 million, while listing on the main board (Taiex) requires a minimum capital of NT$600 million plus an annual net profit equivalent to six percent of that.

Phoenix has the distinction of being the first travel consultancy to list on both.

Liao insisted his company’s listing was not driven by a need to raise capital. “Travel agents have enough cash,” he said.

“It is more about image. People will notice, and customers will feel more comfortable dealing with Phoenix. It will help us form alliances with partners in the trade, as well as in the globalisation of our business.”

Phoenix’ IPO is well timed, as Taiwan’s travel industry – barring a worldwide financial meltdown – is poised for growth. The country has opened its borders to mainland Chinese tourists in recent years, and the government has set a ten-year goal of increasing tourist arrivals from five to 10 million.

Liao named several other travel consultancies rumoured to be planning listings, but of them only one, Lion Travel, agreed to talk to TTG Asia e-Daily.

“We plan to have our IPO by the third quarter of 2013,” said Lion’s vice president, finance, Sam Huang. “Right now, the environment is good. Taiwan’s travel industry is growing and will continue to do so in coming years.

– Read more in TTG Asia, November 18 issue

By Glenn Smith

MALAYSIA Airlines (MAS) is set to axe its services to Buenos Aires, Dubai, Cape Town and Johannesburg as part of a cost cutting exercise, according to a report in The Star yesterday.

In a related move, the flag carrier will also cease using Kota Kinabalu as a hub and terminate services from there to Tokyo (Haneda), Osaka and Seoul.

Quoting an unnamed source, the report stated that the axing of flights to Buenos Aires, Cape Town and Johannesburg would take effect in February.

The pullout from Dubai, meanwhile, would take place gradually—first with the reduction of weekly flights and those via Karachi and Damman.

Kuala Lumpur-based Corporate Information Travel senior manager, Shirley Ho, said: “This development does not look good for MAS as a national carrier because its hub is becoming smaller.”

“Our customers will still be able to fly to the destinations as other airlines serve them, but it is going to be an inconvenience as they would prefer direct flights,” she added.

By N. Nithiyananthan

FASTBOOKING, a Paris-based specialist in web-driven hospitality sales and marketing programmes, has set its sights on expanding its reach within Asia, especially in the flourishing markets of China and India.

According to Henry Teng, managing director, FastBooking Asia, the company intends to add 1,000 to 1,200 hotels to its existing portfolio of 1,400 member properties across Asia, over the next two years.

The company has 7,000 hotels across 70 countries under its belt at the moment.

In China, FastBooking is looking to increase its crop of hotels from the current 100 to 500 within the next two years, with properties in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou targeted first.

Plans have also been drawn up to grow the number of properties in India from 16 to 400 over the next 12 months, particularly in New Delhi and Mumbai.

The company is also looking to seal partnerships with several property management system providers in an attempt to accelerate its regional expansion.

Meanwhile, Teng told TTG Asia e-Daily that the company recently introduced tools to help member hotels manage traffic on social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter.

These social media products will be released full-scale in the first quarter of 2012, according to FastBooking co-founder and COO, Soraya Kefs.

THE ABU Dhabi National Exhibitions Company (ADNEC) -owned Hyatt Capital Gate hotel will become the first independently-branded Hyatt property outside the US when it opens by year-end.

As a standalone brand under the Hyatt umbrella, the five-star Hyatt Capital Gate will have its own distinctive logo and brand identity, and will target high-end business travellers.

The hotel will offer 189 guestrooms and suites occupying the 18th to 33rd floors of the Capital Gate building, which forms part of ADNEC, the largest conference and exhibition venue in the Middle East.

“From a very early stage ADNEC and our partners, Hyatt Hotels Corporation, envisioned Hyatt Capital Gate as a one-of-a-kind property, in a global city and located inside one of the world’s most outstanding buildings,” said Sanjay Tanna, business development & investments director, ADNEC.

“The standalone identity conferred on Hyatt Capital Gate is an apt reflection of the distinctiveness and splendour of the property.”

Group and corporate clients of Hyatt Capital Gate will be able to avail of the 73,000m2 of indoor event space at ADNEC – which includes three 750-pax banqueting halls, and 20 smaller meeting rooms that can each accommodate ten to 100 pax.

THE SEVENTH China Business Travel Forum came to a close in Shanghai yesterday, with the annual B2B conference having provided a series of educational insights for those seeking a better understanding of the Chinese business travel industry.

Hosted by American Express Global Business Travel, in partnership with the Shanghai International Conference Management Organisation (a division of the Shanghai Municipal Tourism Administrative Council), the conference drew some 43 suppliers from the airline, hotel, car rental and GDS industries, and over 2,000 visitors, compared to around 1,700 last year.

New to the conference was the Senior Executive Summit, which saw some 15 procurement officers from Chinese-owned companies discussing business travel procurement developments, and how China’s five-year plan and new social media platforms were impacting business travel.

Another first was the creation of a MICE area showcasing American Express Meetings & Events, a division that has been rebranded from its former name, Corporate Meetings Solutions (TTG Asia e-Daily, May 26).

Meanwhile, central to the plenary session was the release of results for the 2011 China Business Travel Barometer survey, which revealed that corporate travel budgets in China have continued to rise despite growing financial uncertainty elsewhere (TTG Asia e-Daily, November 10).

By Patricia Wee

CHINA’s significant growth in GDP continues to steer the progress of the local MICE and business travel industry despite the lacklustre global economy, according to findings from the 8th Annual China Business Travel Barometer.

Commissioned by American Express Global Business Travel, the study surveyed 286 executives from 211 Chinese owned and 65 non-Chinese owned organisations with 100 or more employees in Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou, between July and August this year.

Results of the study, announced at the 7th Annual China Business Travel Forum which concluded yesterday, revealed that companies’ travel budgets have continued to rise, due to a strong desire to strengthen client/partner relationships and develop business in new markets. RMB72 (US$11.30) out of every RMB100 spent on travel and entertainment expenses is invested in growing and sustaining business.

Chinese companies retain an optimistic outlook on business travel, with an expected average budget hike of six per cent, and fourty-six per cent of companies surveyed saying their budgets would grow in 2012.

MICE budgets have also seen an increase, with thirty per cent of Chinese-owned companies surveyed saying they were likely to have four or more MICE activities a year, compared to only 16 percent of non-Chinese companies.

Meanwhile, despite the rosy outlook, companies in China are starting to pay attention to hotel and accommodation costs (77 per cent), followed by MICE spending (58 per cent), and air travel (53 per cent).

Cindy Zhou, senior buyer, finance & operations services at Roche based in Shanghai, said: “Our budget this year continues to remain around the same as last year, but we are paying close attention to cost; face-to-face meetings are very important for the business still.”

By Patricia Wee