Group items tagged

The battle for India’s lucrative travel market among global distribution systems is not over yet — even if Travelport has won hands down with exclusive rights to distribute Air India’s domestic flights content in India.

For a split second, it appears that Travelport can sit pretty and command control of a vast market all on its own. Sabre announced at the start of the year that Air India had decided to withdraw from it. Amadeus had pulled out in December 2018 after Travelport’s win, awarded in October 2018 and fully implemented by January 1, 2020, which was just too much for it to swallow. So the grass was looking green for Travelport with neither Sabre nor Amadeus on the turf

But Amadeus announced last week that it’s back in with Air India, even if it’s only with the airline’s international flights content, not domestic, which is now fully ensconced in Travelport. And while Sabre has failed to renew its contract, which expired at the end of 2019, the company said it is still engaging with Air India on a new agreement.

reducing its presence on global distribution systems and awarded Travelport sole distribution rights of its domestic inventory. 

Legal proceedings from Amadeus began in 2018

a new relationship enabling

Mumbai: MasterCard will bring its 'Priceless Cities' programme to India, as part of its initiative for creating experiences to promote the brand.

Under the programme, MasterCard has identified cities and provided experiences which include a visit to the Louvre in Paris after closing hours, or access to the Chichen Itza pyramid in Mexico during a full moon.

"With mobile phones, we can be more intelligent in targeting the customer," said Rajamannar. "This is why we are deploying our real-time digital marketing which enables us to reach out in a hyper-targeted, hyper-local and hyper-relevant fashion."

E-Marketing, also called Online Marketing, Internet marketing, I-marketing, web marketing, etc., plays an important role in maintaining hotel revenue as well as occupancy. Several aspects like Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), Social Media Optimisation (SMO), Search Engine Marketing (SEM), Email Marketing , Portal Marketing, Mobile App, Mobile Website, Website Maintenance, Future E-Marketing v/s Offline Marketing have been touched upon in this article in order to give an insight into the strategic importance and role E-marketing can play.  

Future of Online Marketing v/s Offline MarketingGrowth of online marketing was low in the initial years due to inhibitions, but it is now growing with extraordinary pace as the confidence of Indian buyers is increasing gradually. Seeing the current behaviour of Indian buyers, online experts estimated that the trend of online marketing will become a basic phenomenon among buyers in coming years. The present and future e-marketers are keeping their eyes on the Indian market trends and studying the consumer behaviour for creating best and attractive deals potential clients.

Portal Marketing: Another form of online revenue sharing consists in people working together and registering online in a way similar to that of a corporation and sharing the proceeds. A third form of revenue sharing on the Internet consists of enticing Internet users to sign up and create content by offering a share of advertising revenue.

Rising concern about the environment in response to global warming is driving thinkers to seek some sustainable solutions and are forcing people to reconsider and amend their ways of living to become more eco-friendly.

Many, if not all, are seeking to redesign their lifestyles and get into the green mode.

green buildings incorporate several sustainable features such as efficient use of water, energy efficiency, eco-friendly environment, use of renewable energy, use of recycled/recyclable materials, effective use of landscape, effective control and building management systems, and improved indoor quality for health and comfort.

Though cloud based PMS is gaining momentum in the global hospitality market, it still has a long way to go in India as hotels are hesitant to adopt it.

Today PMSs have become more powerful, with features that enhance efficiency, improve control over processes, enable faster delivery of services, and engender guest loyalty. But among the biggest trends in PMS is cloud computing. The introduction of cloud based PMS has revolutionised the hospitality industry globally as it has opened up a vast array of features, allowing hotels to work in a new environment that is highly efficient, secured and technical, and minimises human errors. It also allows easy accessibility anywhere across the world and can be customised according to the hotel’s requirements.

despite the benefits, cloud based PMS still hasn’t been able to gain the much needed impetus in the India market. Concerns over internet connection loss and data security are the two consistent arguments against cloud-based PMS.

 Innoviti Payment Solutions announced that after successful pilots, it will now start extending its newly introduced cloud-based reconciliation technology to full-service restaurants, that require payments to be collected at a customer's table with automatic reconciliation with the bill.

The new technology works in a simple way. In a typical restaurant example, the central billing server first uploads every new bill generated to Innoviti's cloud-based integration server. Thus, the Innoviti Integration Server maintains an updated real time list of all pending bills that are yet to be paid. When a patron calls for his check, the waiter assigned to the relevant table simply uses the table's id to 'pull' the correct pending bill from cloud-based integration server on to the portable POS terminal in his hand. Once payment is completed on POS terminal, it generates an on-spot charge slip and updates back the necessary payment details against the specific pending bill on cloud server and then onwards to the restaurant billing server which initiated the bill.

Across India, Innoviti processes over US$ 6.5Bn of payments annually from over 1000+ cities, with a throughput per point of acceptance of 7000$, 2X of India's average (as per RBI data). Innoviti's payment solutions help merchants, banks and brands influence commercial transactions happening in offline commerce more efficiently than possible otherwise, through unconventional use of payment terminals.

E-commerce in India is gearing up for some massive changes from February 1. Foreign e-commerce players — like Amazon and Flipkart — will no longer be able to offer consumers ‘deep discounts’ or sell their own brands through their respective platforms. It’s a big blow to Jeff Bezos’ and Walmart, and not the best news for consumers in India. Local vendors are voicing their support for the new policy, hoping they can regain some market share, without having to lose more money by offering discounts.

India will ban e-commerce companies such as Amazon.com and Walmart -owned Flipkart Group from selling products from companies in which they have an equity interest.

The new regulations follow complaints from Indian retailers and traders who say e-commerce companies like Amazon have created an unfair marketplace.

India’s retail market is dominated by small corner shops, which are now threatened by the e-commerce giants.

Expedia reports that 65% of hotel bookings within this last 24-hour window are via mobile, and 15% for flight bookings. Vegas is a particularly striking example of this last-minute mobile booking trend, with 32% of all bookings coming in via mobile,

does this mean that traditional travel companies and online travel companies should

rush into launching a mobile app?

Your mobile can now literally be the key to your future and open many doors, thanks to a new technology that can have your cellphone talking to your locks.

Frequent travellers can now skip the check-in and check-out process into hotels, collecting keys at reception counters and spending time in lounges paying bills, thanks to Near Field Communication technology that makes mobiles do your work, says Sanjeev Anand, sales and key accounts manager, India, of VingCard Elsafe, supplier of hospitality security solutions worldwide.

His entry is automatically recorded on the front desk.

however electronics may also have more subtle and long-term repercussions for our greater ecosystem.

It is estimated that more than two thirds of heavy metals in landfills come from electronic waste.

The lack of monitoring and regulation by the government can mean that little-to-no safety precautions (such as wearing protective gear and air filtering) are taken to protect workers while they carry out their job.

IOT can be one of the biggest boons to the hospitality industry. You’ll be surprised to know that the number of internets connected “things” already exceeded our population back in 2008.

By 2020 this number is expected to reach 50 billion. A whopping $19 trillion is anticipated as cost-savings and profits from this investment.

According to the sources, of all the businesses that chose to implement IoT, 94% have already seen a return on their IoT investments.

ecognizing that operating hotels is a global industry, HFTP determined that there is not a globally accepted method that financial professionals, ownership structures, investors and benchmarking information services can use to support efficient operations. There is also not a globally accepted method to monitor investment performance from region to region without significant assumptions and data mining.

Currently, research is being conducted into current practices. This research will identify who is doing what in different parts of the world, with a view to establishing best practice and providing practical guidance for students, practitioners and professionals involved in the industry.

In order to create a global resource for the hospitality finance industry, Hospitality Financial and Technology Professionals (HFTP®) began development on a global hospitality accounting system users guide this past March. Recognizing that operating hotels is a global industry, HFTP determined that there is not a globally accepted method that financial professionals, ownership structures, investors and benchmarking information services can use to support efficient operations. There is also not a globally accepted method to monitor investment performance from region to region without significant assumptions and data mining. HFTP’s Global Hospitality Accounting System Users Guide (GHASUG) will address this need. Where does the project stand right now? Currently, research is being conducted into current practices. This research will identify who is doing what in different parts of the world, with a view to establishing best practice and providing practical guidance for students, practitioners and professionals involved in the industry. The guidance will be formulated by industry experts, based on the research findings. To date HFTP has commitments from major information benchmarking companies, hotel corporations, hospitality associations and globally recognized hospitality schools around the world. Once completed, HFTP will make the outcome accessible online, together with analytical tools. It will be available at a minimal cost and users will have the capability to print versions if they desire. The hotel sector currently enjoys the benefits of an accounting structure developed in the USA specifically for the industry.  The Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry has been widely adopted, principally by US based operating companies, and linked to management contract terms.  HFTP has been involved in this project for many years and will continue to sponsor the 11th edition in support and via a monetary contribution.

A survey sponsored by SAP suggests businesses are looking to make investments in IT and their workforce but struggle to find lenders

Effective use of technology was seen as a key priority in achieving growth, and according to respondents, the three main internal obstacles to growth were finding and keeping new customers (79 percent), hiring and retaining people with the right skills (78 percent) and operating the business efficiently (76 percent).

Effective use of technology was seen as a key priority in achieving growth

Representing more than 5 billion square feet of space in the United States alone, there is an enormous opportunity for the industry—and guests—to positively affect the built environment.

the opportunity for triple-bottom-line wins when hotels think sustainably

sparked in part by guest preferences