Tag Archives: FICCI

As part of its mandate to further enhance India’s digital drive in the travel and tourism industry, the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) launches its maiden initiative aimed at travel start-ups. ‘Travel Tech Launchpad’ will be a platform that encourages innovation and growth of travel start-ups and will be set up during the second edition of FICCI’s event titled ‘Digital Travel, Hospitality and Innovation Summit’ to be held on March 22-23, 2017 in New Delhi. The summit content has been developed to enhance the potency of travel start-ups, digital tourism and IT-based infrastructure development for the travel and hospitality sector. ‘Travel Tech Launchpad 2017’ is being organised by FICCI in association with Agnitio Consulting LLP, Nucleus Partners, and Charson Advisory. The summit will offer an opportunity for travel startups to learn from experts in the field of travel, exhibit their business ideas, and display their products & services in addition to providing a unique opportunity to connect with right set of ecosystem partners. A number of travel start-ups, hospitality and technology companies from across India and abroad will gather during the summit in addition to the participation of leading investors such as Sequoia, Inventus Capital, Kae Capital and several angel / venture capital firms.

Japan Tourism is expanding its presence in India with a new office in Delhi scheduled to commence operations by the end of the year. This was announced at the first ever India-Japan Tourism Meet organised by FICCI in New Delhi from Oct 24-25, 2016. Dr. Jyotsna Suri, Immediate Past President-FICCI, Chairperson -FICCI Tourism Committee said, “Japan is the 10th largest source market for India with around 2.07 lakh Japanese arrivals in 2015. India has a very high potential to be one of the favoured destinations amongst the Japanese tourists, given the large number of destinations important from Buddhist interest as well as the burgeoning number of business tourists coming to India.” Giving his opinion on the summit, H.E. Kenji Hiramatsu, Ambassador of Japan to India, said that with the framework of Indo-Japan Tourism Council and Indo-Japan Tourism Summit, the industry should pursue action-oriented outcomes to improve travel and tourism relationship between Japan and India in a visible way. “This is a great opportunity for both governments and tourism industry to get together under one roof and to discuss the expansion of bilateral travel and tourism relations. The new networks that will be built among the participants today will create new opportunities,” he added.

Keeping pace with the rapid penetration of internet and mobile, FICCI has initiated the Online Travel and Technology Committee which will function under the aegis of the existing FICCI Tourism committee. The Committee will be led by Dhruv Shringi, Co-Founder & CEO, Yatra Online while the Committee will comprise of key stakeholders of online travel companies including MakeMyTrip, Cleartrip and various other key stakeholder and knowledge partners from the online travel sector.“The Committee has been formed for outlining the roadmap for a robust regulatory policy for the online travel industry and to encourage innovation in travel & tourism sector,” informed Dr. A. Didar Singh, Secretary General, FICCI.

The second edition of the Tourism Investors Meet (TIM) organised by FICCI brings together 72 buyers and seven sellers, who are representatives from difference state governments, and aims to host more than 600 meetings over two days, informed Dr Jyotsna Suri, Chairperson, FICCI Tourism Committee and Chairperson & MD, Lalit Suri Hospitality Group, at the addressing the inauguration of the summit. The event commenced on July 28 in New Delhi after a speaker session which was graced by Vinod Zutshi, Secretary, Ministry of Tourism, Govt. of India, Suman Billa, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Tourism, Govt. of India, Ramesh Abhishek, Secretary, DIPP, Govt. of India, Nikhil Sahni, Senior President – Government Banking & Strategic Government Advisory, Yes Bank, Dr Didar Singh, Director General, FICCI. On the occasion, the dignitaries released the FICCI-YES Bank knowledge paper on ‘Investment in Tourism Infrastructure: Unleashing the Growth Potential’. Representatives from the tourism departments of Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Delhi, Punjab, Madhya Pradesh and Telengana were present to showcase projects in a bid to attract more private players. Through the private public partnership model, the summit aims to harness the enormous investment opportunities offered by the tourism sector.

Commenting on the General Budget 2016-17, Jyotsna Suri, immediate past president of FICCI, said, “Nothing for tourism this year, is it something new? Overall the budget this year was on infrastructure, rural development and spending on buildings. That is what is the need of the hour. This is going to increase the economy and that will somehow affect tourism altogether. Though we didn’t have much for tourism this time like last year I think if economy grows tourism will grow.”