Simon Akeroyd, VP, Corporate Strategy & Business Development, Amadeus Asia Pacific has penned this piece for aspiring travel startup entrepreneurs.

There’s no doubting that the world of business is changing. The traditional model of large international corporates functioning in a singular, closed-door fashion is fast disappearing, with companies now open to collaboration or outsourcing. While previously big corporates, protected by expensive barriers of entry, were responsible for all “business problems” in-house, technology has now made it possible for many of these issues to be outsourced.

And here lies the opportunity for the B2B entrepreneur. The last few years have seen an unprecedented rise in the number of startups globally, not least Asia where there are over 47,000 startup companies listed on angel.co. Often seen as polar opposites with differing goals and priorities, many large corporates and disruptive startups are now finding they can benefit one another. Startups are capitalising on the fact that big businesses need them, they are working to tackle business problems outside the larger company’s domain, with the outside chance of finding themselves targets for acquisition by the very companies they are trouble shooting for.

In fact, even if a trade exit doesn’t materialise, there are still plenty of compelling reasons for startups to partner with corporates. For one, working alongside a trusted corporation provides startups with credibility in an often-crowded marketplace. With an established corporation as a partner or key customer, the startup is well-placed to be taken seriously by their peers. Secondly, by working alongside larger, more established companies, startups can piggyback off robust marketing and PR strategies that may save them from falling foul of any crises that can often plague new companies. Finally, the scale of a large organisation provides a startup with strong distribution channels, significantly improving the situation of the startup, whilst also reducing the overall risk.

Simon in a tuk tuk in Sri Lanka Image Credits: Amadeus Blog

So how should you go about founding a successful startup?

Three steps to startup success:

1. Identify the problem you want to solve.

For large travel companies (including Amadeus), there’s always a long list of problems or challenges, of varying levels of priorities, which we’d love to focus on. However, more often than not, there isn’t the time or the resources to look at them all. Most companies have limited capacity to implement every change and advancement that they want to; there are always projects that get pushed down the to-do list. It’s those non-urgent tasks that could be the real sweet spot for a startup, a great advantage for the budding entrepreneur. Rather than the stress of worrying about sales figures (which should generally be consistent), or spending time marketing to attract new customers, the startup can instead focus on serving that one customer with that one product.

2. Do your research.

Familiarize yourself with the industry, assess the work of competitors and keep an eye on what technologies and innovations are coming next. Take a hotel, for example. Maybe they want to cut their laundry bill or determine how rooms can be cleaned in a more efficient way to offer early check-ins, accommodate late check-outs, offer an amazing guest experience and drive loyalty. It could even be how to improve internal efficiencies or manage their supply chain better. If a startup can offer a solution to these types of problems, they become a valuable match for any corporation and far more likely to succeed.

3. Choose the right support.

With the number of accelerator programmes multiplying throughout the region, it can be difficult to determine which is the best fit for you and your partner. It is vital that you find the right experts to partner with in order to have the best chance of success. Not an accelerator or an incubator, Amadeus Next is a community, nimble and flexible, just like a startup itself, which leverages the technology and expertise of our experts to provide support to travel technology startups. We currently partner with more than 30 startups, and surprisingly over 70% of these companies have some form of B2B (business-to-business) component, with almost 55% being purely B2B.

Why B2B?

Founding a B2C startup is undoubtedly an attractive idea. Many entrepreneurs dream of creating a company with mass appeal. The next Airbnb, Line or Grab perhaps. However, these ‘unicorn’ triumphs are rare (hence the name), and in my opinion, entrepreneurs would be wise to consider an alternative route on their quest for startup success. While it is true that some B2C startups bring great ideas, technology, and solutions to the travel industry, for many it can be very difficult to get off the ground, particularly for first-time entrepreneurs. From the get-go, B2C startups must be alert to many things, including having a strong marketing strategy in place that stands up against the big names already dominating the B2C travel industry. You have to compete for a potential travellers’ attention against the massive marketing budgets, years of brand exposure and known services of the likes of TripAdvisor, MakeMyTrip, Expedia or Ctrip, amongst others. Most well established travel brands have a solid funnel of customers and it’s hard to take those customers (and their loyalty) away.

The reality is that many B2C startups we see aren’t favourable to investors, many of whom prefer to fund B2B businesses in a bid to establish more stable earnings. It may sound glamorous to launch a B2C startup, but according to CB insights, in 2016 there were only 25 unicorn “births” globally, 68% less than in 2015[1].

So the next time I see an exciting Asian startup trying to make it in travel, this would be my advice; don’t get fixated on becoming an industry disruptor in the consumer sphere, instead explore how your technology can help solve an important issue in a B2B company. While it may not be their current priority, or one which their R&D team is focusing on, by helping to solve that problem, you could make a huge difference to a company’s business, and hopefully the chance of success for your startup.

[1] https://techcrunch.com/2017/01/31/cb-insights-3358-tech-exits-in-2016-unicorn-births-down-68/

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Nobody likes travelling in economy. It gets even worse if you are taller than most people as airlines try to fit as many seats as they can in economy cabins and take away all the legroom. Airlines offer the option to upgrade through emails or on their websites. However, the process is a little clumsy and most systems close the option long before the departure. Usually airlines process the frequent flyer points upgrade requests and cash bids till 48 hours before the flight.

Even after this, lot of premium seats go unused on a flight, indicating lost revenue opportunity for the airline. Seatfrog tries to change that by offering passengers the option to bid for upgrade till the last minute. This way, the airline is able to free up economy seats in economy that were overbooked or for last minute selling while making some revenue out of the premium seat that would have otherwise been unused or given away as free upgrades.

Seatfrog has joined as a part of Amadeus Next community. This would allow them to reach a large number of airlines that work with Amadeus while also gaining access to Amadeus’ technology. Their data will also help Seatfrog fine tune the product to tailor it better to consumer and airlines’ requirement.

“Seatfrog has been an important partner in the Amadeus Next community since its inception, so I’m particularly excited to see that partnership producing real, innovative, customer-focused solutions. Seatfrog is incredibly smart, mobile, and will deliver an outstanding passenger experience.” said Simon Akeroyd, VP, Corporate Strategy and Business Development at Amadeus Asia Pacific.

He added, “Innovation is about doing things differently and finding real solutions to real problems, and that is exactly what Seatfrog has done. The team has aligned today’s always-connected mobile passengers, with the challenge faced by airlines around the globe — selling seats that would otherwise fly empty, at the exact time that passengers think about upgrades.”

Seatfrog has a strong focus on mobile to tap into the USD 130 billion airline ancillary industry. The travellers can bid and pay for upgrades in real time and also receive their revised boarding passes on mobile.

CEO and co-founder of Seatfrog, Iain Griffin commented, “The team at Amadeus really understood the challenge facing airline partners and worked with Seatfrog to solve many of the friction points that stand in the way of the deployment of an effective ancillary revenue strategy. Ultimately, our platform is bringing a new level of intelligence to market in delivering the right product, in the right channel at the right time.”

“Mobile has spearheaded a dramatic shift in global passenger behaviour, with over 83 per cent using it as their primary travel tool, and airlines need to think like retailers if they are to take advantage of this evolution. Seatfrog will help Airlines to drive higher engagement and unlock significant revenue while delivering a superior mobile experience right up to the gate.”

The Seatfrog APIs can be integrated easily into the existing systems so that airlines can start using the system right away. An Amadeus research indicates that airlines should focus their efforts on mobile as the passenger’s intent for ancillaries is maximum within 48 hours of the flight.

Griffin said, “Research shows giving people the chance to upgrade on traditional channels isn’t enough. This is where Seatfrog comes in. We use behavioural design and real-time data to deliver a user experience that adapts to passenger behaviour and enables passengers to make better decisions at the perfect time. We chose to work with Amadeus Next because of the team’s commitment to innovation and agility, its acute understanding of the airline ancillary problem and the game-changing nature of Seatfrog’s technology, which can deliver huge benefit to the airline customer base. Ultimately, airlines will be able to upsell and maximise revenues with the perfect mix of right product, right channel at the right time, while providing their passengers with an outstanding customer experience on mobile.”

You can find more details about Seatfrog on their website www.seatfrog.com.

Promising travel startups like Seatfrog make for great addition to the Amadeus Next community. If you have a startup that deserves to be a part of the community, sign up for the upcoming Startup Knockdown now.

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Last week the Kolkata edition of Startup Knockdown was concluded successfully with Airlines Technology and Izifiso emerging as the winners. The event was highly appreciated by participants and attendees alike. The startups received valuable inputs from the mentors to fine tune their business processes and even got invited by NASSCOM and Calcutta Angels for further discussions. Now we are all set for the Hyderabad edition of the event during TTF Hyderabad and just like the previous event, our partners have been really helpful in putting it all together. Here are the partners for Hyderabad event:

Judges and Mentors for Hyderabad edition

Hyderabad Angels

Hyderabad Angels (HA) is a group of seasoned angel investors who are keen to invest in promising start-ups and early stage companies to create tangible as well as intangible value.

Established in early 2012, HA investors are leading venture capitalists, entrepreneurs and business leaders, who, with their financial and business acumen, are committed to providing support to the rapidly growing Indian start-up ecosystem. Besides providing the much needed capital, we provide businesses with distinctive mentoring, access to our network and handholding the company through its entire lifecycle from fund raising with great focus on strategy and execution. Although based out of Hyderabad, we source investment opportunities from all over India and work closely with other Angel Networks, early stage VCs, Accelerators and Incubators.

T-Hub

T-Hub is a unique public/private partnership between the government of Telangana, 3 of India’s premier academic institutes (IIIT-H, ISB & NALSAR) and key private sector leaders. It stands at the intersection of the start-up, academic, corporate, research and government sectors. T-Hub is designed for technology related startups with a vision to catalyse the creation of one of the tightest and most vibrant communities in order to encourage and fuel more startup success stories in India.

Indian Angel Network

Indian Angel Network is a network of Angel investors keen to invest in early stage businesses which have potential to create disproportionate value. The members of the Network are leaders in the entrepreneurial ecosystem as they have had strong operational experience as CEOs or a background of creating new and successful ventures. They share a passion to create scale and value for startup ventures.

Started in April 2006, the Indian Angel Network in addition to money, provides constant access to high quality mentoring, vast networks and inputs on strategy as well as execution. The Network members, because of their background are better able to assess the potential and risks at the early stage.

Amadeus

Amadeus is at the heart of the global travel industry. They join and connect the key players in travel tech to shape the future of travel. The Amadeus Next initiative goes with their vision of building and fostering the leading travel tech startup community In Asia Pacific.

Under Amadeus Next, they mentor, nurture and partner with startups in Asia Pacific to take them to the Next level on their journey to scale into awesome companies. Next leverages Amadeus’ technology, expertise, reach and funding to empower entrepreneurs to challenge the status quo.

Entrepreneur.com

Marking its 18-year anniversary in 2015, Entrepreneur.com has evolved into the most widely used website by entrepreneurs and leaders in business worldwide. As the leading small business website, Entrepreneur.com serves its visitors’ needs by creating the most satisfying experience with relevant content, logical information management and ease of access.

When business owners need answers, Entrepreneur.com is their ultimate source for solutions. Visitors access the website to find new insights and delve into core issues that affect every aspect of business management. Entrepreneur.com is their trusted mobile business partner, ready to connect them not only to an infinite source of information but also an expansive online community where entrepreneurs meet, share and grow.

DigitalDefynd

The Digital Marketing Hub. A place for digital marketing professionals and organisations to share, learn and grow. A community to communicate, contribute and collaborate. A forum for getting answers to your queries, sharing solutions and helping each other.

Myles

Myles is India’s first self-drive car rental service. Driven by technology to simplify the process and enhance the consumer experience, Myles offers more than 38 car models from different manufacturers and flexible renting options with the option to rent by hour, day, week or month. The fleet is spread in over 21 cities with more than 250 pickup locations. With this, they are looking to make urban transportation simpler while working towards eliminating the hassles associated with car ownership.

Funstay.in

Started in early 2015, Funstay has grown leaps and bounds in its reach and now has the largest listings of homestay in India and is also the fastest growing homestay portal in terms of number of property listings.

The journey of Funstay is not that of a typical business, rather it is a journey of five friends with one common passion-Travel. Ever since they completed their education, each one of them has travelled widely both within the country and abroad. During these travel experiences, many a times they had stayed with locals at their homes, stayed in a village hut or in a cottage between vast coffee plantations. This gave birth to the idea of Funstay as they realized that the travel experience becomes exponentially richer and memorable when one can understand and get involved in the local heritage.

Froottrip

Froottrip is a provider of travel services in India and is an extension of Flightcatchers.com which is based in UK. Froottrip caters to the price conscious travellers by offering best handpicked travel deals from affordable flights to a wide array of hotels and tailor made travel packages. It offers everything one needs for an amazing holiday, without breaking the bank.

We would like to thank all our partners for supporting the event. The event will be hosted at Hitex Exhibition Center in Hyderabad along with TTF Hyderabad.

If you are a travel startup and missed signing up for the Kolkata or Hyderabad event, fret not. Sign up for the other upcoming editions at startupknockdown.travhq.com.

The post Introducing the partners for Hyderabad edition of Startup Knockdown appeared first on TravHQ.

Booking Boss, an all inclusive booking system for tour, activity and attraction operators, has joined Amadeus Next. Booking Boss is an Australia based startup that also emerged as the Travel Innovator of the year at the Phocuswright Conference 2014. Last year, they closed a USD 2 million Series A funding round.

To achieve the goal of transforming the travel activity sector all over the world, Booking Boss has joined Amadeus Next community. With this new association, Booking Boss will have access to Amadeus’ technology and with the wide reach of the global travel brand, the startup will also have reach to the global network. This would allow Booking Boss to be more visible across the APAC region and explore new possibilities in the region.

Booking Boss was launched in 2013 by Renee Welsh and Andy Welsh, a couple with more than two decades of experience between them in travel industry. Commenting on this new development, Booking Boss CEO, Renee Welsh said,

“The most exciting thing is the ability for us to access world class technology and connectivity from one of the travel tech greats – Amadeus”

“We joined because this opportunity provides us with direct insight and mentoring from one of the largest and most successful travel technology organisations in the world. It’s the perfect platform for support, insight and to be connected with Amadeus and its customer base,’ added Renee.

Discussing the significance of a platform like Booking Boss in the activity space, Simon Akeroyd, VP, Corporate Strategy, Amadeus Asia Pacific said,

“Tours and Activities represents a huge portion of the travel industry but traditionally bookings have been fragmented and mainly offline. Booking Boss offers a great platform which helps bring the offer online, allows providers to tap into new customer bases and manage their bookings in a more efficient way. We’re proud to support them through Amadeus Next and offer our technology, expertise and customer network so they can grow their business.”

Booking Boss will be joining many other promising travel startups that are a part of Amadeus Next. To know more about Amadeus Next, read our interview with Bart Bellers. Senior Advisor, Corporate Strategy, Amadeus Asia Pacific.

If you think you have a product that deserves to be a part of Amadeus Next, sign up for Startup Knockdown+. Amadeus will choose the most promising startup from the participants to be a part of Amadeus Next.

The post Booking Boss joins Amadeus Next to expand its reach appeared first on TravHQ.

Agnitio Consulting LLP, a leading New Delhi based travel, tourism and hospitality advisory firm, has inked a landmark agreement with Amadeus, the leading provider of technology solutions for the global travel industry for Amadeus Next. The objective of Amadeus Next is to nurture a community of young innovative startups in travel and connect the key players in travel to shape the future of the industry.

With its strong understanding of the travel industry and experience of working with startups, Agnitio shares a vision similar to Amadeus Next and has the potential to make significant contribution to the community. That is why the two companies have decided to work together towards growing Amadeus Next.

Highlighting the importance of associations like this, Simon Akeroyd, VP, Corporate Strategy, Amadeus Asia Pacific commented, “Partners are a crucial element of the Amadeus Next community. They extend the knowledge and technology beyond what Amadeus already offers, and provide start-ups with access to expertise, software, connections or even funding which they couldn’t otherwise access. Agnitio Consulting’s network and strong relationships with the Indian travel and tourism industry, will help Amadeus Next start-ups based in India, or looking to expand into the Indian market, to make their business model a success.”

Agnitio works with startups to identify the gaps in their processes, optimise services, open new channels, coach leadership and help raise funds. They also have strategic partnerships in place with leading industry associations that can significantly help the startups that are a part of Next. Amadeus mentors the startups that are a part of the Next family and Agnitio can play a part and help them achieve their business objectives. The association will also enable for the startups to leverage the strong network and reach of Agnitio to drive alliances with key stakeholders in the industry.

Talking about how Agnitio Consulting was intending to proceed, the Managing Partner, Mr. Ashish Kumar said, “We shall support Amadeus Next to reach out to potential startups through our strategic partners, with guidance and mentoring of selected start-ups. We will support start-ups by connecting them with existing industry players and associations. We will work closely with the Amadeus technology team around user requirements, web services / APIs. Most importantly, we shall also help startups in product ideation, conceptualisation and the realisation of their product roadmap or vision.”

Audio Compass, Tripoto, TripHobo, ConfirmTkt and Rimoto are some of the startups that are a part of Amadeus Next. Audio Compass joined recently after winning the Amadeus Next award during Phocuswright India. ConfirmTkt joined after emerging as the winner of Startup Knockdown Delhi.

Amadeus Next and Agnitio have also extended their support for the upcoming Travel Startup Knockdown+. You can find more details and register for the event at startupknockdown.travhq.com.

The post Amadeus Next and Agnitio join hands to support travel tech startups in APAC appeared first on TravHQ.

One of the most anticipated tech event globally, Google I/O, concluded recently with many new interesting announcements for the travel tech ecosystem. On the other side, we are gearing up to host a serious of Startup Knockdown+ events to give more power to travel startups. There was a lot more happening over the month that made for interesting discussions. Just in case you missed them over the month, here are the top stories from May.

1- Facebook brings new ad options for travel brands

A large number of travel brands rely on Facebook for advertising their products and Facebook identifies that. To improve the experience for their audience and give them more control, Facebook recently introduced new Dynamic Ads for Travel to display better tailored ads to people interested in travelling. The social network has also introduced the Dynamic Ad option for Instagram.

Full story

2- Startup Knockdown is coming back with lot more for innovators in travel

We are bringing Travel Startup Knockdown+ in association with TTF to offer the innovators in travel industry a platform to showcase their get in the spotlight. The events will be hosted in four cities with different partners who will be brining lot more opportunities to the table. The registrations for Kolkata event are open with names like Amadeus, NASSCOM, Calcutta Angels Network, Agnitio and many others willing to take the promising ones to next level. You can register at startupknockdown.travhq.com.

Full story

3- Simon Akeroyd shares what Amadeus has learned working with startups in Amadeus Next

Amadeus introduced Amadeus Next last year to nurture a community of travel tech startups in APAC. Amadeus Next has been operating like a startup itself and according to Simon, VP, Corporate Strategy and Business Development, Amadeus Asia Pacific, this has brought in many new learnings for Amadeus. We spoke with him to know more.

Full story

4- Go-Jek associates with Indonesia’s largest local transportation company

Go-Jek, Uber’s local rival in Indonesia, is associating with Blue Bird, country’s largest taxi and transportation company. Go-Jek will allow Blue Bird to move ahead on the technology curve while gaining access to a large fleet of cars to offer through its platform. This announcement came only a few weeks after Blue Bird was in news for strongly opposing the operation of other major cab hailing companies in the market, Uber and Grab.

Full story

5- Hyperloop One successfully conducts first test in Nevada

An idea that was being termed radical not long back saw the light of day in form of this first prototype. Hyperloop One is still far from what it has to be but the recently concluded test shows that ground transportation might indeed become fast, very fast in future. It is being termed as ‘Concorde of ground transportation’ and claims to bring down the cost of a 400 mile journey to USD 20.

Full story

6- Google I/O brings daydreaming and chatty bots

Google I/O 2016 was sure to have a lot for anyone who loves technology. This year, Google announced improved Android Pay, more options in Android Auto along with the ability to use on phone, a new VR ecosystem called Daydream, a new chatting app called Allo along with a smart assistant accessible through it and Instant Apps for Android devices.

Full story

7- Alex Lopoukhine shares how Viator cracked the activity code

Tours and activities aren’t easy to distribute and only few players in the market seem to have cracked the code. Viator is one big name that is strong in the activity space. We had a chat with Alex Lopoukhine, Director, Business Development at Viator to know the key.

Full story

8- Should travel brands start exploring the chat bots immediately?

Chat bots are certainly being seen as the next big thing in travel industry and as AI technologies improve, they will offer more features. However the big question is should travel brands, especially the young ones with limited resources, start exploring the possibilities immediately? The guest story tries to answer that along with some more possibilities that can be explored.

Full story

9- Skyscanner brought in a chat bot and we took it for a spin

While we were weighing down the pros and cons, Skyscanner went ahead and decided to try what they can do with bots, now that Facebook has opened up Messenger to third party developers. We tried out the bot to see what it offers and what it doesn’t.

Full story

10- SITA and ShoCard plan to change authentication process at airports

SITA and ShoCard are working on a prototype based on Blockchain technology to eliminate the need of producing physical identification documents at every security checkpoint. The identity would be stored on a bitcoin blockchain and a token generated by the passenger would allowed for validation of ID against the validation data stored on the database.

Full story

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Amadeus umbrellas yet another start-up named Crayon Data, Asia’s fastest growing big data companies under their travel technology start-up community, Amadeus Next. Amadeus Next, the community was created to mentor, nurture and partner with start-ups, and to evolve new and original ideas in travel, and support go-to-market efforts.

Amadeus is a leading provider of advanced technology solutions for the global travel industry. Customer groups include travel providers (e.g. airlines, hotels, rail and ferry operators, etc.), travel sellers (travel agencies and websites), and travel buyers (corporations and travel management companies).

Crayon, with its growing presence in various geographies, will benefit from Amadeus’ global reach allowing Crayon Data to expand its services to a global audience. The travel industry is changing rapidly, enormously and fundamentally.  Digital channels are the primary source of inspiration and planning, and remain a critical part of the entire journey. Personalisation now means profit.

Based in Singapore, Crayon Data is a big data start-up where its flagship product Maya is a personalization engine that facilitates choice delivery for the banking, hotel and digital media verticals.

Maya is built on Crayon Data’s proprietary platform, Simpler Choices, which empowers enterprises with the ability to deliver ultra-personalized choices to their consumers. It does this by creating a consumer taste fabric, using over 14 recommender systems and proprietary cognitive thinking TasteGraph algorithms to work on vast internal and external data sets.

Speaking on the partnership with Amadeus Next, Srikant Sastri, co-founder of Crayon Data, said, “Crayon Data is thrilled to be part of Amadeus Next. We look forward to working with Amadeus and benefiting from its vast knowledge base, eco-system and reach within the  travel and hospitality industry, to develop cutting edge solutions and take them to market. This will change the future landscape of travel.”

With Crayon’s Maya, hotels and OTAs now have an opportunity to build trail-blazing, mobile first, curated travel experiences that can deliver personalised itineraries, from choice-to-commerce. Maya personalises engagement right through a customer’s ‘decision-making journey’. Crayon’s unique proposition has resulted in multiple clients across international markets, in the past year alone.

Speaking on Crayon’s innovations, Bart Bellers, Senior Advisor, Corporate Strategy at, Amadeus Asia Pacific, said, “What we like about Crayon Data is that they’re solving personalisation at the other end of the spectrum. Instead of trying to map a traveller’s personality, Crayon Data brings meaningful insights to travellers about the atmosphere of hotels and restaurants by building taste graphs of each and every property. Amadeus Next is very excited to have them on board and we look forward to supporting their growth with Amadeus’ technology, expertise and customer reach.”

Crayon, a portfolio company of Jungle Ventures, has been accredited as one of the most successful and innovative big data start-ups in 2014 and 2015, by global platforms such as TiEcon, CEBIT, IBM Watson, Intech50 and OrangeFab. Other travel technology start-ups on board Amadeus Next include Booking Boss, Klook, Orahi, Triposo, TopDocs, TripVerse, TakeMe Tour, Seatfrog, ConfirmTkt,TraveLibro, Tripoto StayAngel, dozo!, TripHobo and PredictHQ.

We recently got a chance to catch up with Simon Akeroyd, VP, Corporate Strategy and Business Development, Amadeus Asia Pacific during Phocuswright India to learn more about Amadeus Next. You can find the interview story here.

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During the recently concluded Phocuswright India, 10 innovators took the stage and each one of them had the potential to change the way we travel. Over the past few years, Asia-Pacific region has been home to many such innovative startups and last year, Amadeus introduced Amadeus Next to help the growth of these young startups. Through Amadeus Next, they collaborate with these startups to evolve new ideas in travel by leveraging Amadeus’ technology expertise and customer reach.

Simon Akeroyd, VP, Corporate Strategy and Business Development, Amadeus Asia Pacific

Simon Akeroyd, VP, Corporate Strategy and Business Development at Amadeus Asia Pacific has been driving the Amadeus Next initiative ever since it came into existence. We got a chance to speak with him during Phocuswright India to learn more about ‘Next’ and the potential it holds. Here is an edited excerpt from the conversation:

How do you think the startup ecosystem in APAC differs from that of the west?

The startups in this region and other parts of the world are in very different stages. In US and Europe, there are more barriers for them due to the dependency on legacy systems. However, in Asia, we have seen that many startups start from scratch as there isn’t so much historical legacy system to build on top of. I see the young companies in Asia-Pacific being able to grow much faster than in other regions.

Talking about the trends, many of the initiatives that we see in Asia are similar to the ones we see elsewhere. It is just that the chances of successful execution are higher here than the other regions.

What was the idea behind Amadeus Next?

The intention is to improve the way we, as Amadeus, work with smaller companies. In the case of Amadeus Next, these smaller companies are travel startups but we have some other initiatives as well which are with more mature companies.

We feel that Amadeus is across the entire travel chain and we power travel, something that we are really proud of. We have to be able to participate where activities are happening in the travel space. To achieve that, we have to shift from being an internally focussed IT company and open up to innovations and enhance them. That is why we started Amadeus Next.

Why the focus on APAC region?

We decided to focus on APAC partly because of some of the reasons I mentioned earlier, being able to move quickly and being responsive. Another reason is that we noticed the innovators in Asia are hungry and excited for being able to make a change and for us that is a very positive factor.

Operating Amadeus Next like a startup, what have been the learnings so far?

We have learned a lot since we launched Amadeus Next last year. When we launched and decided to work with startups, we thought the biggest challenge would be money. We were under the impression that they would all expect us to help them raise funds, however, we learned that it is not about the funding. Obviously it isn’t easy for startups to attract investors and raise funds but that wasn’t their prime focus. Their focus was on getting access to customers and improving their technology. So, quite quickly, we learned that for startups, it is more about how we can open up our technology for them and bring our customers to them.

There are also some takeaways for Amadeus among which the big one is “Get out of the building”. In large corporations, there is a tendency to spend a lot of time debating amongst a closed group about what is right, what people want and you end up wasting a lot of time that way. For Amadeus, the learning is to get out of the building, ask the consumers and stop debating internally if they want blue or red. So one of the benefits of the program is that we improve as a company and learn to be closer to the market.

What is next for Amadeus Next?

There are two major trends that we see in the travel space. The first one, sharing economy is already impacting us significantly and is shifting towards access economy. During the Travel Innovation Summit, Myles cars talked about reducing redundant inventory for cars. In Amadeus Next we have Orahi, which is a carpooling service and I think that kind of shared economy, which is already here and is growing very fast, is going to be a major interest area for us.

On the other side of it, there is the Internet of Things, pretty important but less well defined than the first one. We don’t know yet where it will end up. The impact of wearables on travel is very hard to guess. We are good at some parts of Internet of Things but there is still a lot to be learned in that space and it will be a massive change for us.

Audio Compass won the Amadeus Next award during Travel Innovation Summit at Phocuswright India. You can find more details about Amadeus Next and the startups that are a part of it at next.amadeus.com.

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FICCI hosted the Travel & Hospitality Tech Conclave and gave us an amazing platform to host the second edition of Travel Startup Knockdown. Dozens of entries came in and finally yesterday, the eight shortlisted startups competed against each other to take the crown and be a part of Amadeus Next.

L to R: Kunal Jain, Co-Founder, Your Local Cousin and Sripad Vaidya, Co-Founder, Confirmtkt

Our panel of judges included Bart Bellers, Senior Advisor, Corporate Strategy, Amadeus Asia Pacific; Sunny Jindal, Co-Founder, TravHQ & Iffort; Aayush Jain, Principal at Unicorn India Ventures; Abhishek Vaish, Founder, Nucleus Partners and Ashish Kumar, Managing Partner at Agnitio Consultancy LLP. They announced Confirmtkt to be the winner of the 2^nd Travel Startup Knockdown. According to them, it wasn’t an easy decision to make and they were caught up between two after narrowing down from the finalists.

A large number of travellers rely on trains to travel in India and often have to wait till the last minute to find out if they have a confirmed ticket or not. Confirmtkt uses analytics to predict the possibility of a ticket being confirmed and also digs into a mine of data to suggest alternate combinations that can be booked at last minute.

We also invited our audience to vote for the startup that they loved the most and Your Local Cousin came out to be their favourite. While planning a trip, we look up places and experiences online but the data is often scattered and incomplete. We also seek help from our friends and relatives but the problem scales up if they aren’t familiar with the destination. Your Local Cousin allows travellers to connect with expert locals who know the place inside out to help the travellers easily plan their trip, avoid the tourist traps and save all the effort.

Here are some more images from the event:

Confirmtkt will be joining the startups that are already a part of Amadeus Next. You can know more about Amadeus Next here.

We would like to thank FICCI and Amadeus for supporting us in successfully hosting the Travel Startup Knockdown.

The post Confirmtkt and Your Local Cousin emerge as the winners of 2nd Travel Startup Knockdown appeared first on TravHQ.

As the countdown for second Startup Knockdown commences, the finalists gear up to pitch their disruptive start-up ideas in front of our judges.We are hosting this session in Delhi at FICCI (Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry) and the winning start-up will be backed by Amadeus Next, an Amadeus initiative that will help the start-up reach its potential while offering technology, reach and funding. The whole idea is to bring these innovators together to provide them with a bundle of opportunities in terms of media recognition, networking and potential investor access.The panel that will be judging the entries include:

Sunny Jindal: Co-Founder at Iffort and TravHQ

Sunny Jindal is the Director and Co-Founder at Iffort and TravHQ. Iffort is a full-spectrum digital and social media agency based out of New Delhi, India. TravHQ is an online media portal that offers information, news, insights and reviews about the travel industry, focussing primarily on the intersection of technology, digital marketing and start-ups across SEA/APAC region. Sunny holds a Masters degree from Northampton University, and his vision helps in executing the project deliveries at Iffort and TravHQ with a process-oriented methodology. He is an avid traveller and loves exploring offbeat destinations when he’s not working. His love for travel has taken him to South-East Asia, Europe and many places across India. He’s a techno-traveller and believes that technology can add tremendous value to his experience.

Bart Bellers: Senior Advisor, Corporate Strategy, Amadeus Asia Pacific

Bart is an experienced business executive and passionate out-of-the-box thinker who has successfully led commercial and innovation initiatives at the leading edge of technology. His credo is: “Think Different” and “Just Do It”. Bart is Senior Advisor, Corporate Strategy at Amadeus Asia Pacific and his role are to lead new business opportunities and seed innovative initiatives in the region. He has been with Amadeus for over 12 years and held management positions in e-Travel, Customer Delivery, Business Development & Innovation. Prior to Amadeus, Bart built up a strong digital, technology and commercial background in the ICT industry and has worked for several start-ups focusing on the development of e-business solutions.

Aayush Jain: Principal at Unicorn India Ventures

Aayush Jain, a Principal at Unicorn India Ventures comes with over 7 years of experience in corporate and product strategy, capital raise, business/corporate development and M&As across sectors including technology, media, cloud, digital, consumer and education. Aayush heads Unicorn’s Delhi operations and is always eager to partner with, mentor and motivate energetic and smart entrepreneurs who trust in technology as a means to disrupt various sectors. Prior to this, Aayush was Head of Corporate Strategy and M&A at Essel Shyam, India’s largest technology-led managed services provider to the broadcasting industry. He was instrumental in expanding company’s broadcasting operations to Southeast Asia and in launching a cloud-based digital distribution product platform for the company. Apart from this, he’s an avid traveller and enjoys playing golf in free time.

Abhishek Vaish: Founder, Nucleus Partners-Private Equity and M&A Advisory Firm

Abhishek has over eleven years of rich experience in managing fund raisings, IPOs, and Mergers & Acquisitions in India, UK, and Europe. He is currently an entrepreneur and is further helping other fellow entrepreneurs in achieving business growth by raising capital or through Mergers & Acquisitions. He has been an advisor to quite a few travel start-ups in India as well. He is a chartered accountant and a commerce graduate from Delhi University. He has previously worked with Goldman Sachs, both as an Investment Banker and a Private Equity Investor for over five years, and worked across various sectors around the world. He has worked on transactions worth over USD 1.25 trillion so far.

Ashish Kumar: Managing Partner at Agnitio Consultancy LLP

Ashish Kumar is a travel and hospitality veteran with over 37 years of experience in the travel sector. Ashish is the Managing Partner of Agnitio Consulting LLP which provides an end to end advisory cum operational implementation support in a partnering approach to organizations. Ashish is a pioneer in driving both revenue side enhancements and cost optimizations in companies delivering sustainable value. He is the driving force in the travel industry in a big way as well. He conceptualized and led the implementation of the technology in a large number of companies such as International Travel House and understood how technology should work to deliver business value. He advises many travel companies in a strategic capacity as well.

Travel startups can find details about the competing start-ups of Startup Knockdown in Delhi here. You can write to us at editor@travhq.com for more details.

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