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- Just this week the traveltech startup Fly Now Pay Later announced a new investment round of €11.5 million, which will allow the company to grow in UK, Germany and launch in US.
- A few weeks ago this could sound like a naive affirmation but hey — things are really getting better. And seems like I’m not the only one saying this. After a strict and challenging fight against the virus, in the beginning of this month China’s domestic travel topped pre-pandemic levels. Also interesting: a wave of investments ended up on 210 million dollars invested on travel startups last week, according to Skift. And when it comes to global hotel investment, the sector is expected to see an increase up to 35% this year. Amazing to see the travel industry gearing up for a comeback!
- When it comes to tourism restrictions, seems like everyone is doing what they can to keep the wheel spinning. Like Italy’s minister Mario Draghi telling people that it’s time to book their holidays. Madeira is now offering free PCR tests for arrivals or departures and even the EU suggesting to relax the COVID-19 restrictions next month. But well, not everywhere: seems like Australia will stay closed for most international arrivals until 2022.
- With the purpose of bringing back tourism UNWTO launched a partnership with Google to support African destinations to use data insights and digital marketing to recover from the current crisis.
- Continuing with the stream of unusual deals in the travel industry during this past months, Expedia is selling Egencia to American Express Global Business Travel. We’ll keep an eye on how the conversations (and deals!) around business travel management evolves.
- TUI will be offering PCR tests for travelers from less than €25. Seems like “getting tested” is the new “packing bags”, uh?
- TripActions has acquired Reed & Mackay, an UK-based travel management company. In my opinion it is totally worth it to read this article and see how Fred Statford (CEO) justifies the “unusual marriage”. One quote that caught my attention: “It has become pretty clear that the future is tech and digital. The world is changing in terms of people’s thinking and how people have got used to working.” Well, I agree 100%.