Li Xinyu | Speech at the Forum on "Digital Transformation and Innovation in the Tourism and Culture Industry"

On July 16th, the China-UAE Tourism Cooperation Forum was held online. Li Xinyu, Vice President of Trip.com Group, participated in a parallel forum: a discussion on digital transformation and innovation in the cultural tourism industry. Her presentation materials are as follows: Trip.com Group has maintained close cooperation with countries in the Middle East. Over a year ago, the Dubai Tourism Authority and Trip.com jointly created the AI ​​robot Xiao Di, which provides one-stop consultation services to potential customers through precise marketing channels such as social media and Trip.com's micro-guide, achieving a peak tourist increase of 40%. We hope to achieve further tourist growth for Dubai through diversified digital marketing methods and creative approaches (game development, VR experiences, etc.). The impact of the pandemic will eventually end, but the demand for tourism will not disappear. The UAE, Israel, and other countries recently announced that they will resume travel in July and August. As the country that has recovered the fastest after the pandemic, China is willing to share some of its practices for tourism recovery. As of July 15th, over the past three months, we have held 18 Ctrip "Boss Live Streams," generating over 700 million yuan in transaction volume and saving users over 1 billion yuan. Local governments have also provided 64 million yuan in tourism subsidies to users on the Ctrip platform, potentially generating nearly 1.6 billion yuan in comprehensive tourism consumption. Travel revenue in Hainan Province and Huzhou City, Zhejiang Province, has increased by nearly 20%, validating the achievements of the "tourism industry community of shared future" built around OTAs and through collaborative efforts. As the initiative of a "community of shared future for mankind" gradually becomes a global consensus in the fight against the pandemic, Ctrip, as the only OTA in China with a global presence, is promoting its experience and model of the "tourism industry community of shared future" globally. Compared to the "complete freeze" of the tourism industry caused by SARS in 2003, Ctrip's product development has progressed much faster. Under its globalization strategy, its resilience has significantly increased. Travel is a globally interconnected endeavor. Only with global recovery can the tourism industry fully recover. On June 22nd, Ctrip, together with partners such as Google and the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC), launched a global tourism revival with an overseas press conference. Following its injection of a 1 billion yuan recovery fund into the "Tourism Revival V Plan" in March, Trip.com further upgraded its recovery fund at this press conference to provide assistance to global partners. It will also leverage traffic resources from multiple platforms both domestically and internationally to drive the global tourism industry to achieve its first large-scale growth since the pandemic. The outbreak of COVID-19 has not only changed the course of the tourism industry but also brought unprecedented uncertainty to both tourism operators and tourists. According to a travel trends report jointly released by Trip.com and Google, "flexibility" has become the most important consideration in travel consumption decisions over the past few months, with 57% of users considering "no-loss cancellation" policies the most attractive feature. As the first OTA to launch a "no-loss cancellation" policy after the outbreak of COVID-19, Trip.com, in conjunction with millions of global suppliers, handled tens of millions of order cancellations for over 400 million users both domestically and internationally during the peak of the domestic outbreak, with a total cancellation transaction value exceeding 31 billion yuan. Faced with the uncertainty brought about by the pandemic, Chinese services, represented by "no-loss cancellation," have not only provided reassurance but have also planted a seed of interest in the minds of users both at home and abroad. Ctrip has extended the selling points of its "Revival V Plan"—"Worry-free Refund, Anytime Refund"—to overseas markets, launching the "Flexible Refund" guarantee plan to spread the flame of hope for recovery globally. Meanwhile, Ctrip's innovation continues unabated. Under the backdrop of normalized epidemic prevention and control, Ctrip has first upgraded group tours to a safer and more controllable "Safe Travel" mode than independent travel. Safe Travel includes nine layers of protection, such as contactless service, real-name authentication, and big data-driven epidemic prevention and early warning. In addition, addressing the issue of crowd gatherings, Ctrip has launched "Scenic Spot Anti-Gathering Service Standards," focusing on the three goals of "no exceeding standards, no queuing, and no gatherings," and introducing 10 measures to build a safe tourism environment. In particular, it utilizes Ctrip's previously launched "Smart Scenic Spot Service Standards," including online real-name reservations, "instant entry," time-slot entry, worry-free refunds, electronic audio guides, and offline automatic ticket machines. More than 2,000 travel agency suppliers and local tour operators have joined the "Safe Travel" alliance for epidemic prevention, and over 100,000 products across the platform, including various group tours, private tours, semi-independent tours, study tours, and themed tours, are now labeled "Safe Travel." These measures have played a significant role following the policy resumption of inter-provincial group tours this week.

Although the pandemic has caused hardships for the tourism industry, it has also spurred innovation and high-quality development in the tourism sector. Ctrip will, from the perspective of a "global tourism industry community of shared destiny", work together with its partners to take practical actions to help the tourism market achieve a high-quality recovery.