Travel leaders to tackle industry issues at ITB Asia convention 2008

ITB Asia convention, to be held from October 22-24, 2008 in Singapore will be attended by the travel industry leaders from around the world, to face industry issues, which are at their most trying and tumultuous phase since 2003. The convention will be attended by up to 5,000 travel delegates from more than 50 countries.

During the convention, CEOs of leading brands in travel namely, Starwood, Accor, Jumeirah, Carlson, PhoCusWright, Sabre, and others, will chart the future and lay bare the opportunities and challenges in all sectors of travel. The kind of holidays consumers are now demanding will be addressed by Peter Long, CEO of TUI Travel, one of the largest tour operators in the world. “In testing times, it is always the ones who dare to confront the future and have a firm grasp on trends that manage to seize the opportunities. There are definite trends that are coming up in tourism and needs attention. The evolution of the hotel industry to meet a changing customer, the realities facing global tour operators as they expand their reach into new markets, the increased penetration of technology into our everyday lives, and how that technology is changing the way we book travel and communicate are among the few changing trends,” said Yeoh Siew Hoon, the ITB Asia Convention programme organiser

In a session called, “Reality: Virtual, Mixed or Otherwise – How Technology Will Change The Way We Communicate and Travel in Future,” during ITB Asia convention, award winning inventor, one of the world’s foremost thinkers in computer science, Professor Adrian Cheok of the Mixed Reality Lab, National Technological University, Singapore, will describe a future where we may not have to physically travel in order to have a rewarding travel experience. “In many ways, you can say technology and change in ideas is faster in Asia than elsewhere in the world,” said Dr. Martin Buck, Director of Messe Berlin (Singapore), which is organising ITB Asia and ITB Convention. “Both are being fuelled by double-digit demand growth in China and India. The result is that the travel industry in Asia is highly challenging – even for the expert,” he added.