Free WiFi, mobile apps drive business travel

Free in-flight WiFi and increased use of mobile apps are driving the $US1.2 trillion business travel sector.

AirAsia CEO Tony Fernandes. Picture: Craig Wilson

Free in-flight WiFi and increased use of mobile apps are the major trends influencing the $US1.2 trillion ($1.6 trillion) business travel sector, according to a survey of the globe’s top tourism executives.

While international business traveller arrivals in Australia grew 2 per cent last year, Tourism Australia managing director John O’Sullivan said the big trend was the corporate incentive packages coming out of China, which could involve up to 8000 delegates from companies like Amway and Nuskin, spending between $12 million and $50m.

“They inject significant economic benefits to the host destinations,” he said.
These business travellers will benefit from an unprecedented level of infrastructure development currently completed or under way in Australia.

AirAsia Group chief executive Tony Fernandes said free WiFi was the biggest trend affecting the business travel sector and that the service would soon be the norm on all airlines, ending excuses for executives to be out of touch from their office or clients. “Business travellers have lost that free space they had,” Mr Fernandes said.

His comments come as new data shows a 12.3 per cent increase in Chinese arrivals in Australia in the year to January 2017 and a 14.1 per cent jump in American arrivals. Singapore, Japanese, Indian and British arrivals were also up, according to Bureau of Statistics figures.

Travelport’s London-based president and chief executive, Gordon Wilson, said the big business travel trend for 2017 would be the relentless move to mobile app devices.

“In the next two-three years, 70 per cent of travel transactions will originate on a mobile,” said Wilson, boss of the New York Stock Exchange-listed Travelport, which owns several Australian software companies.

“Seventy per cent of that 70 per cent will be untouched by a human being. One of our fastest growing accounts is Hopper, a mobile-only travel site in the US,” he said. Mr Wilson said business travellers would stay for shorter periods but spend more, adding that business travellers kept airlines afloat.

Like Mr Wilson, Mastercard Senior Vice-President, Retail & Commerce, Catharina Eklof, said the biggest trend for business travellers was their desire to control everything from their mobile phones.

And in light of the United Airlines recent debacle, where a passenger’s forcible removal from a US flight went viral, Mrs Eklof said: “Companies also need to know that consumers will react and that will have an impact on the stockmarket.”

Bangkok-based Deepak Ohri, chief executive of Thailand’s Lebua Hotels & Resorts, said another trend among business travellers was to add leisure days to their trip. “I see a trend emerging of two-days business and one-day leisure,” Mr Ohri said.

David Scowsill, the outgoing boss of the World Travel & Tourism Council, agreed the lines between business and leisure travel were blurring.

“Many tourism destinations are tapping into this new trend and offering tourism products that directly cater to business travel,” he said, adding that business travel now accounted for nearly a quarter of the world’s tourism and travel spending.

Marriott International chief Arne Sorenson said the most powerful trend in the travel industry was that people wanted experiences more than consumer goods such as cars. A decade ago people wanted to buy a house or car, Mr Sorenson said. “Today they will eat out or have a vacation before they buy a car.”

The writer travelled to Bangkok as a guest of the World Travel & Tourism Conference