Brought to you by Travelport
Travelport Delivers New Modern Retailing Tools on Travelport+
Travelport, a global technology company that powers bookings for hundreds of thousands of travel suppliers worldwide, introduced the latest update to its next-generation platform, Travelport+. Now available, these enhanced, modern retailing tools are paving the way to revolutionize travel retail, modernize the booking experience, and make it easier for agents to offer more choice and deliver better service to their travelers.
“As part of our mission to revolutionize the travel industry’s retail experience, we continue to evolve, simplify, and automate the most critical technology tools. Today’s enhanced features empower travel agents to offer more choice, enable greater self-service capabilities for travelers, and simplify the most complex servicing processes. All Travelport+ customers enjoy a more modern, digital-first retail experience when connecting through our platform. That includes our desktop customers, who have said that the latest version of Smartpoint has managed to transform mundane travel management tasks into superior servicing opportunities.”
Jen Catto,
Chief Marketing Officer, Travelport
More Choice, Richer Content, Better Servicing
The evolution of Travelport+ tools and agency capabilities continues with simplified access to enriched travel content from multiple sources, including NDC (New Distribution Capability) standard content. Travelport is the first and only global distribution system (GDS) to sign NDC content distribution deals with all three major European airline groups (Air France-KLM, International Airlines Group (IAG), and Lufthansa Group). The company continues to expand its NDC connections with more than 16 airlines worldwide, including American Airlines, Emirates, Qantas, and Singapore Airlines.
“Together Emirates and Travelport are starting their journey to deliver the future of travel retail; kicking off with our first-ever GDS joint agreement that is inclusive of NDC content; that will enable the flexibility to innovate Emirates’ products and deliver more dynamic and personalized offers.”
Adrian Kazim,
Chief Operating Officer, Emirates
Travelport continues to add more servicing capabilities to improve airline connectivity and empower agents to better service travelers with less back-end work. Travelport’s hotel content distribution is also seeing an upgrade with richer room, rate and rules details as a result of upgraded connectivity with Hilton.
Simplified Trip Management for Agencies and Travelers
Customers using the latest version of Travelport’s desktop tool, Smartpoint, can access a suite of features aimed at simplifying everyday tasks. Enhancements include more customized itinerary quotes in Trip Quote as well as faster Assisted Ticketing capabilities that streamline complex ticketing and exchange tasks for agents.
“Thank you Travelport+ for making our lives so much easier. The improved trip quote capabilities within Smartpoint means we are much faster at providing travellers with highly customized itineraries that better meet their needs.”
Rachael Keller,
Operations Manager, Globetrotter
Travelport has also launched a new Trip Manager portal on Travelport+, offering travelers the ability to service their own trip, and carry out fast, easy transactions on the go. The self-service option for travelers using the new portal allows agencies to preserve resources while providing travelers an improved experience with the ability to easily add extras to their trip.
“Trip Manager provides everything our customers need to self-serve on tailoring their trip – all in one place. From adding meals, bags, selecting seats and automatically checking into their flight it simplifies the travel process, allowing our customers to enjoy the experience.”
Lenka Nemcova,
>Head of Business Travel, OK Tours
Intelligent Storefront and Self-Service Tools
Travelport continues its Intelligent Storefront mission with Travelport+. Enhanced APIs make it easier for agents to understand offers and compare brands with similar attributes on a like-for-like basis. Travelport customers will also be able to easily identify upsell offers with NDC and ATPCO fares, for a simpler, more modern browsing and shopping experience.
Agencies can better manage the hotel bookings they sell with a simple self-service rules engine, the Content Optimizer. This tool compliments previous improvements to fare management tools so that agencies can easily create and customize their own content rules. This will help travel agents maximize revenue across every trip they sell.
Western Australia to remove barriers on March 3
Western Australia will finally permit interstate and international entry from March 3, 2022, announced premier Mark McGowan today.
Triple-vaccinated interstate travellers will be allowed into Western Australia without the need for quarantine, while international arrivals will be permitted if they meet the Commonwealth requirements to enter Australia, and take an ART within 12 hours of arrival. Positive results must be reported.
Unvaccinated returning Australians to the state will have to undergo seven days of hotel quarantine.
McGowan conceded that “the virus is already here and we cannot stop its spread”. According to news reports, the state set to reach a peak of 10,000 new cases a day by the end of March.
McGowan had earlier in January cancelled intended border reopening on February 5 due to a surge in Covid-19 cases.
He confirms that the March 3 reopening is final, and a further change is unlikely.
HK govt calls on hotels to pitch in for quarantine room inventory
With the latest surge in Covid-19 infections paralysing Hong Kong’s healthcare system, the government has turned to the hotel sector for help in supplementing isolation facilities.
In a February 16 webinar with key representatives from the Real Estate Developers Association, Hong Kong chief executive Carrie Lam sought provision of at least 10,000 additional rooms as community isolation facility (CIF).
The government currently has some 4,400 rooms in the CIF inventory, of which 1,700 will be utilised by the end of this week and the rest before the end of next week.
The government’s CIF hotel scheme caters to people who test positive for Covid-19 but have no or mild symptoms. Participating hotels must meet specific criteria, and will be reimbursed by the government for their service.
Regal Hotels Group, a member of the Real Estate Developers Association, will respond to the call by converting several of its hotels into CIF. A spokesperson said arrangements are now being made for this conversion.
Fellow member Chinachem Group, which owns and runs key hotel chains across the destination, has designated Nina Hotel Causeway Bay and Nina Hotel Kowloon as CIF from late February and March respectively.
Michael Li, executive director of the Federation of Hong Kong Hotel Owners, said the industry is in full support of the scheme, and the Federation has shared the call for help with members.
He told TTG Asia that more than 10 hotels with an estimated 6,000 to 7,000 guestrooms were likely to respond to the request.
The opportunity to participate in the CIF hotel scheme acts as a lifeline for Hong Kong hotels stricken by reduced tourist arrivals as a result of the fifth – and latest – Covid-19 surge, according to Li.
“Designated quarantine hotels in town are suffering a lot, as many international flights are banned. Their average occupancy stands at about 30 40 per cent. So, some of them have switched to become CIF,” said Li.
More cruise travellers are booking direct: GlobalData
Cruise bookings have shifted away from intermediaries and OTAs, with many travellers opting to book directly with the cruise line, according to GlobalData’s findings from its recent report, Key Trends in Cruises (Cruise), 2022 Update – Analysing Key Market Trends, Opportunities, Challenges, and Projects.
Industry revenue from cruise intermediaries in 2021 increased by 65% year-on-year (YoY) from US$11.8 billion to US$19.5 billion. However, cruise passengers have increased at a significantly higher rate. According to Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), cruise tourism had risen by 95% YoY from 7.1 million to 13.9 million people.
Craig Bradley, associate travel & tourism analyst at GlobalData, commented: “Unlike other sectors in travel and tourism, the percentage increase in revenue for specialist intermediaries is not correlative with cruise passenger growth in 2021, suggesting that cruise tourists now prefer to cut out the middle-man and book directly with the cruise line.”
Due to the pandemic, it is generally expected both passenger revenues and trips to be broadly similar in their growth rate, with only marginal differences. For example, if taking a look at global outbound travel in its entirety, total trips increased by 95% YoY in 2021 and outbound revenues increased by 99% YoY according to GlobalData’s Tourism Demands and Flows Database.
However, specifically for the cruise industry, it is clear that intermediaries are underperforming with revenue increases 30% lower than passenger growth.
On the other hand, further research from GlobalData reveals that this change in booking behaviour reflects the current consumer sentiment towards intermediaries. In a 3Q2019 Tourism Consumer Survey, 44% of respondents said they typically book via an intermediary such as an OTA. However, in a 4Q2021 survey, only 24% of respondents said they booked their last holiday via this booking method. In addition, respondents who said they booked directly with the provider increased from 32% to 36%.
Bradley added: “There is a whole list of reasons why travellers now prefer to go direct, all of which are a result of the pandemic. Some want more flexibility and peace of mind, while others have had their confidence damaged due to poor customer experience, particularly dealing with refunds.
“Furthermore, the skills shortages in the industry are also problematic, with many cruise sales agents laid-off during the pandemic and subsequently moving into different careers. However, these issues are all fixable, indicating that this may be just a temporary shift, but cruise intermediaries must act now to ensure they can capture demand in 2022.”
Mandarin Oriental signs first Maldives property
Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group will be managing a new resort on a private island in The Maldives that is scheduled to open in 2025.
Currently under development, the 34-hectare resort will stretch across three private islands on Bolidhuffaru Reef in South Male Atoll, and can be accessed by a 20-minute speedboat ride from Male’s Velana international airport. The Group is working with a number of international consultants to ensure sustainability best practices are followed in all stages of the development.
The accommodation will comprise 120 standalone villas, made up of 56 overwater villas and 64 beachfront villas, including 10 branded Residences at Mandarin Oriental. Villas will range in size from 200m2 to 1,000m2, and some will have private pools.
Guests will be able to choose from six dining outlets, including three speciality restaurants and a sunset bar. There will also be indoor and outdoor event spaces for corporate meetings or social gatherings.
Recreational activities include a watersports and dive centre, tennis courts, a kids and teens club, a swimming pool, and a spa comprising 12 treatment suites, vitality pools, sauna and steam rooms as well as a beauty salon.
Tamai Shimada joins Conrad Centennial Singapore as sales director
Conrad Centennial Singapore welcomes Tamai Shimada as the new director of sales.
In this role, she is responsible for the overall hotel sales performance and strategy of the hotel.
Tamai has a wealth of hospitality operation and management experience spanning over 10 years of which seven years were spent with Hilton.
The Japanese started her career as a Front Office Guest Service Agent in both Hilton Niseko Village Hokkaido and Hilton Surfers Paradise Hotel & Residences Gold Coast Australia, before taking up a sales position in Bali. She returned to her home country to join Hilton Tokyo in 2016 and was later promoted to assistant director of sales at Hilton Osaka.
Novotel Hotels & Resorts, Goa welcomes new DOSM
Novotel Goa Candolim and Novotel Goa Resort & Spa have appointed Rohan Samarth as cluster director of sales & marketing.
Samarth will be responsible for the entire management of the sales and marketing programmes, along with the implementation of strategies and budgets for the two properties.
He brings with him 10 years of experience in revenue management and knows the Goa market from his past association as director of revenue with Novotel Hotels and Resorts Goa in 2016.
Rohan has been associated with Accor for the last seven years. His last assignment was a corporate role as director of revenue and distribution for Ibis and Ibis styles India.
Indian tourism associations maps way to 2035 arrival target
The Federation of Associations in Indian Tourism & Hospitality (FAITH) has released a document that details how India can work towards her target of 75 million tourists by 2035.
To achieve the ambitious targets, considering India’s 10.9 million foreign arrivals and US$30.05 billion foreign exchange in 2019, FAITH’s tourism vision 2035 proposes four strategic pillars – shared national tourism approach, value accretive regulations, investment drivers, and market excellence.
The vision document stresses the need to raise India’s competitiveness as a tourist destination by lowering taxes and making key policy changes, such as offering industry status to the tourism sector and allowing single window e-clearance for all tourism and hospitality projects.
It also recommends creation of five mega tourism zones in different states, focus on last mile connectivity, appointment of global tourism brand ambassadors, and focus on shorthaul international tourism, as well as the formation of national tourism council with participation from the prime minister and chief ministers of different Indian states.
Nakul Anand, FAITH chairman, said: “We believe that India has a great opportunity to achieve 75 million foreign tourist arrivals by 2035 if the government considers our recommendations. India, despite her immense tourism potential, only captures 1.2 per cent of the world’s international tourist arrivals.
“However, with required policy changes and focus on key segments including heritage, adventure, Buddhist circuit, medical and MICE, India can record 75 million inbound tourists (in addition to) 7.5 billion domestic tourism visits. This will result in US$150 billion foreign exchange earnings from inbound tourism, and US$225 billion from domestic tourism.”
Garish Oberoi, former president of the Federation of Hotel & Restaurant Associations of India, criticised India’s high Goods and Services Tax (GST), blaming it for making both domestic and inbound tourism expensive.
“The 18 per cent GST category for hotels with room rates of more than 7,500 rupees (US$100) must be abolished and merged with the 12 per cent GST category. Gradually, GST should be brought down further, below 10 per cent with full set-offs in line with global trends,” urged Garish.
Chiming in with recommendations for India’s business events sector, Amaresh Tiwari, vice chairman, India Convention Promotion Bureau (ICPB), said a global MICE bidding fund with a corpus of five billion rupees was needed.
“We (also) need to create city convention bureaus in each of our main cities, which will work with ICPB as their hub to carry out a global bidding activity,” he said.
Resorts World Sentosa to begin expansion works in 2Q2022
Construction works for the expansion of Resorts World Sentosa (RWS) will commence in 2Q2022, starting with Universal Studios Singapore and Singapore Oceanarium (SGO).
Minion Land, a new highly immersive themed zone, will join the Universal Studios Singapore theme park, offering multiple rides including one that will be the world’s first original ride exclusive to the theme park. Themed shops and restaurants are planned for this zone too.
The existing S.E.A. Aquarium will be rebranded as SGO and grounds will be tripled in size to take in a larger scale and depth of content. Backed by rich marine science knowledge, exhibits will provide immersive and multi-sensory storytelling of the evolution of the oceans’ inhabitants, fascinating oceanic zones such as the largely unexplored deep ocean, as well as unique representations of Singapore’s coastal ecosystems. It will offer fresh and enriching educational experiences and programmes that inspire positive mindset change and drive action to protect the oceans.
SGO will also encompass a Research and Learning Centre that is carbon-neutral. Fully equipped with immersive learning labs, collaborative workspaces, seminar rooms and a rooftop event space, the Centre will augment SGO’s educational offerings and provide advanced facilities for scientists and researchers to conduct valuable research work and drive marine science outreach on-site. It aims to catalyse the test-bedding of innovative solutions for real world challenges, and empower students and the community at large with hands-on learning experiences.
The two upgraded attractions are key components of RWS’s expansion plan, also known as RWS 2.0 when it was first announced in 2019.
According to RWS, the two attractions are envisioned to become Singapore’s new tourism icons and purpose of visits.
Backed by a S$400 million (US$297.6 million) investment, RWS 2.0 will bring a mix of new attractions, entertainment and lifestyle offerings to the integrated resort and facilitate the property’s contribution to Singapore’s tourism recovery.
Refurbishment of three existing hotels – Hard Rock Hotel Singapore, Hotel Michael and Festive Hotel – is also part of the plan, and work will be carried out in phases from 2Q2022 through 2023.
Festive Hotel will be refashioned into a bleisure (business-leisure) and workation (work-vacation) hotel with a variety of mobile working spaces and lifestyle offerings that will meet new work trends.
Resorts World Convention Centre will also enjoy an upgrade to strengthen RWS’s position as a premier business destination.
RWS CEO Tan Hee Teck said: “With our upcoming RWS 2.0 developments, we are confident that RWS will be well-positioned to lead the recovery of Singapore’s tourism as borders gradually reopen. We are excited to welcome the return of more international travellers with an even more vibrant RWS in the near future.
“RWS’s vision for the next decade is to become a sustainable and innovative top tourism destination in line with the Singapore Green Plan. As we begin construction works on our expansion, we continue to pursue a holistic approach to destination building. We are acutely aware of the need to embody into our designs a more sustainable environment, and are engaging various stakeholders and consultants to incorporate the latest technology and research into our developments to achieve this goal.”
Taipei-headquartered Starlux Airlines has taken delivery of its first A330neo B-58301 in France – the first of eight that will be leased as the airline expands its fleet.
The aircraft will be put into service after the approval process and required crew training is completed in May. Three more will be added to the fleet this year, and they will operate additional routes to major cities within Asia-Pacific, including Macau, Ho Chi Minh City, Singapore, Bangkok and Tokyo.
Starlux’s A330neo features 297 seats – 28 in business class and 269 in economy class, a larger overhead storage, and state-of-the-art LED lighting that can set the right ambience throughout all phases of a flight and even reduce jetlag.
Cabin interiors will adopt a “Pure Tea” colour theme, featuring natural tones, warm fabric and leather, along with a Polaris ceiling panel to create a relaxing atmosphere.
Privacy in business class is offered with a 1-2-1 seating layout, ensuring a private entrance for every passenger. Every seat can fold down into a flat bed, and comes with a side cubby for storing personal belongings, a reading light with three brightness levels, and a wireless charger.
Over in economy class, passengers can find comfort in additional leg room and high-quality leather headrests that can be adjusted six ways to provide head and neck support for various postures. Seats are also fitted with a tablet holder and a cup holder.
The A330neo inflight entertainment system is upgraded to offer a 17.3-inch 4K screen in business class and a 13.3-inch 4K screen in economy class. Bluetooth audio connectivity is available for passengers to use their own headphones onboard. 3D interactive “Kid’s map” is added for little passengers.
Company chairman K W Chang said the acquisition of the A330neo aircraft “marks a key milestone in our growth”.
“With the addition of the A330neo, Starlux can deploy our fleet more flexibly and provide our service to more passengers over regional routes,” he said.
Starlux is commencing a full upgrade of its fleet, which will include delivery of 18 A350 XWBs beginning 3Q2022.