January 27, 2010 at 2:55 am
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Small and medium-sized tourism operators in Association of South-East Asian Nations (Asean) are set to get a powerful online presence even if they don’t have a website.
The initiative is the result of a strategic collaboration between Kuala Lumpur-based Creative Advances Technology and the Asean Tourism Association (Aseanta) and Bangkok-based Asean Competitiveness Enhancement Project.
In a joint statement, they said the new platform would allow tourism players to go online and get new business for free.
“The collaboration will boost Asean tourism business opportunities by putting operators’ travel packages on multiple travel trade and consumer online sites, including Aseanta’s the new southeastasia.org portal.
The Aseanta portal uses Standard Online Tourism Architecture (SOTA).
SOTA uses networking linkages to connect travel businesses with potential customers, both trade and consumer. To date, SOTA connects over 900 travel agents and over 15,000 travel suppliers worldwide.
Meanwhile, SOTA chief executive officer and founder, Rohizam Md Yusoff, said through this electronic tourism platform, tourism players could be linked and networked within the industry more effectively.
“The online tourism industry continues to grow quickly as travel customers look for more convenient ways to research, plan, book and purchase their travel,” he said.
Source: Bernama