- Experts from Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) and Microsoft to upgrade online data platform for timely insights into the Asia Pacific visitor economy
BANGKOK, 2017-Feb-02 — /Travel PR News/ — The Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) has announced a collaboration with Microsoft that is designed to improve tourism data collection and develop advanced analytics that help travel industry operators better serve their customers.
Experts from PATA and Microsoft will work together to upgrade the PATAmPOWER online data platform that gives members a broad range of timely insights into the Asia Pacific visitor economy.
This collaboration benefits all 850-plus PATA members including government, state and city tourism bodies, international airlines, airports and cruise lines, educational institutions and travel industry companies in 101 countries.
PATA CEO Dr. Mario Hardy said, “With this collaboration our goal is to produce even better data more quickly to our members in both graphic and tabular formats. The challenge with visitor data is that it is often one dimensional and pulled from a limited number of sources that may render analysis difficult and misleading.
“We will also work together on mechanisms for data fusion and linkage, geo-tagging for PATA member attractions, and analysis of travellers’ data through credit card expenditure and social media feeds. This will ensure data is pulled and analysed from various visitor touchpoints so that PATA members are privy to complete visitor information. This enables our broadly-based membership to plan more effectively the promotions and campaigns that target different consumer groups,” he added.
Erick Stephens, Chief Technology Officer, Microsoft Public Sector Asia, said, “We are pleased to collaborate with PATA to enable its members to transform the way they engage with travellers and capture, through data, the business opportunities of tomorrow. Building better, stronger engagements by harnessing data for a complete view of customers and drawing actionable intelligence, predictive insights that can deliver personalisation at scale have become crucial for the business of today.”
Data and insights will be shared at technical or strategic demonstrations and workshops at various PATA events as well as stand-alone training programmes directed towards PATA government members. Such technical sessions will allow participants to learn the tools of the trade, such as the analytic components, while the strategic sessions will focus upon the vitally important area of data interpretation.
About PATA
Founded in 1951, the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) is a not-for profit association that is internationally acclaimed for acting as a catalyst for the responsible development of travel and tourism to, from and within the Asia Pacific region. The Association provides aligned advocacy, insightful research and innovative events to its member organisations, comprising 95 government, state and city tourism bodies, 27 international airlines, airports and cruise lines, 68 educational institutions, and hundreds of travel industry companies in Asia Pacific and beyond. Thousands of travel professionals belong to the 40 local PATA chapters worldwide. The chapters organise travel industry training and business development events. Their grassroots activism underpins PATA’s membership of the Global Travel Association Coalition (GTAC), which includes ACI, CLIA, IATA, ICAO, WEF, UNWTO and the WTTC. The PATAmPOWER platform delivers unrivalled data, forecasts and insights from the PATA Strategic Intelligence Centre to members’ desktops and mobile devices anywhere in the world. PATA’s Head Office has been in Bangkok since 1998. The Association also has official offices or representation in Beijing, Sydney and London.
Source: PATA
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