Technological innovation upend the tourism industry

                                                                                           RongjiaHu&KeZhao

It is firmly convinced that the technology plays an important even vital role in the travel and tourism industry. Nowadays, in our daily life, the innovation of technology facilitates the global transaction of information, shortens the physical distance  and makes it easier to connect people from all over the world. Recently I’ve read an article that talked about the new digital technology overturned the tourism industry. In this article, it mentioned several technologies, such as biometric baggage, cloud passport, personalised travel, spontaneous travel apps and virtual reality travel. We take an example of biometric baggage solutions and cloud passports, there is no need for tourists to take the paper passport, the airport can use the biometric technology to identify the tourist, and in the meanwhile they also use the biometric technology to chase the location of the baggage, this kind of technology is already used in some organizations such as Dutch airline KLM and Dubai International Airport.It decrease the risk of loss of passport and baggage and enhance the security and efficiency of transport.

Passport is regarded as a necessary ID document when people go abroad for any kind of activities, especially for travellers, they may not go anywhere without their passports with them.However, the paradoxical aspect is that we even worry about the lost of our valuables when we have them with us.So cloud passport seems a good news for all the outbound travellers since the physical passport is no longer on the must-list of traveling items. It means IT industry again help tourism industry eliminate a trouble thing. According to the data from the DFAT that 38718 passports [1] are reported lost during 2014 to 2015, which means the government has to solve the problem for instance making a new passport.In short, the cloud passport cuts down on the tourist’s concern about the loss of the passport  and also decreases the workload of the tourism department.The article also refers to the biometric baggage solution, which is a new self-service of check-in luggage. People go to the kiosk to print baggage claim tag and drop their luggages on the belt instead of manual service, for example, Air New zealand installed its first biometric enabled self-service bag drop in 2015 [2]. Both of the cloud passport and the biometric baggage solution are supposed to improve the passengers’ experience and make boarding service more efficient and convenient. As an indispensable part of tourism, the facilitation of transportation service  also rises people’s desire for traveling and promotes the development of tourism in reverse. Moreover, the paper also mentioned the virtual reality experience in hospitality which is a means to increase in-room spending. The implementation of new technology in any process of traveling can have a butterfly effect on the other industries such as food and beverage, entertainment industries since they are complementary to each other.

I never had the experience of these new technology mentioned above, but personally I like the concept of cloud passport because it is quite useful, we would never be worried about boarding or shopping in duty free shops without paper passport. However, I have read about some experiences of self-service luggage check-in from the article “<<Bag drop issues>>: automated luggage systems drop the ball”[3], which indicates some disadvantages of the automated service. People who use the self-service machine tend to save the queuing time somehow but even meet more difficulties, they may find it is not an easy procedure without clear instruction. From the point view of first-class passengers, automated service should not be the one and only choice in the airport even though it is convenient because more paid air ticket should have more considerable service. It may not the resonant idea for everyone but at least it should be taken into consideration. All in all, IT definitely shortens the running cost somehow for tourism industry and improves the travellers’ experience but it lengthens the distance between the customer and the staff. What do you think about an airport in completely silence without any conversation between each other because we do everything with automated machine.

To summarize, just like the Colliers International said in the article, "Like the rest of the world, the travel industry is adapting to our highly digitalized lives and this is presenting huge opportunities for innovative thinkers to pioneer new solutions."  We still need technological innovations to ensure that the whole tourism industry keep the path of the changing world, and also we need to think that whether every innovation is really positive for people’s life.

Article:http://www.khaleejtimes.com/technology/digital-savvy-holidaymakers-upend-travel-tourism-trade

References:

[1]http://www.gq.com.au/entertainment/tech/7+facts+you+need+to+know+about+the+cloud+passport,39973

[2]http://www.futuretravelexperience.com/2015/12/air-new-zealand-launches-biometric-enabled-self-bag-drop/

[3]https://runwaygirlnetwork.com/2016/01/23/bag-drop-issues-automated-luggage-systems-drop-the-ball/#comments

The inspiration of future tourism industry -- Virtual Reality technology

    Although Virtual Reality technology has only recently been developed for mass production for entertaining purposes, but as recent presentation by Mark Zuckerberg at MWC 2016 during Samsung Galaxy S7 launch, he gave his version the future of VR technology – the next platform.

    As many topics have been raised within video game industry, more and more attention also has been drove into tourism industry.

    Virtual reality technology that made to connect to computers and mobile devices, it gives users a 3D experience and allows them to feel like they’re walking around inside a virtual world. Using VR technology, you could one day virtually visit a museum, explore a theme park, and even take a hike through one of our national parks. Tourism destinations also could use the new technology to give a taste of what they offer, as well as venues could attract more tourists. One of the first corporations to use virtual reality to promote tourism destination is British Columbia, Canada, which virtual reality tech allows users to hike, boat and ride through several of the country's national parks (video link as below). 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SkHdRvPbv4

    Another example of this comes in the form of virtual tours, which will allow travellers to experience a holiday destination before booking their trip. In January 2015, U.K. travel agent Thomas Cook partnered with Samsung and virtual reality filmmakers Visualise to create a series of short films of several destinations. Customers visiting stores in the U.K., Germany and Belgium could then try these taster experiences using the Samsung Gear VR headset.

This technology is a serious opportunity for brands to rethink how they could develop and create real life experiences, and how to bridge the gap between digital and reality. From another side, due to the characteristic of tourism product, it’s intangibility. There was no way for any tourists to taste their destination decision, hotel booking, tour reservation before they exactly there. Now the VR technology has showed us the possibility, and more important is that with VR technology it will inspire the willing of traveling. And also the potential of VR technology in the tourism industry lies not only in offering the consumer virtual trips but also helping travelers reduce language barriers or other unpleasant issues when combined with wearable devices.

Reference

·          Himanshu Patel, Richard Cardinali, (1994) “Virtual Reality Technology in Business”, Management Decision, Vol. 32 Iss: 7, pp.5 – 12

·          Daniel A. Guttentag, (2010) “Virtual reality: Applications and implications for tourism”, Tourism Management, Volume 31, Issue 5, October 2010, Pages 637–651

·    Robin Letellier, “Virtual Reality ...
... A New Tool for Sustainable Tourism and Cultural Heritage Sites Management”

The Augmented Reality (AR) – a new Digital Immersion Service

No no, no Doctor Who in his TARDIS (Image 1) and Timey-wimey-stuff here… But a new way to experience tourism thanks to Augmented Reality (AR) and its ability to procure a time travelling experience to visitors.

Image 1. Doctor Who's paintings (source: intbride.blogspot.fr)

Last 17th and 18th of March 2014 have been held in Deauville the second Numeric Tourism forum. Tourism is nowadays increasingly adapting itself to new technologies and when the fancy Google Glass is making the headlines, the whole Augmented Reality (AR) topic has also been brought back to actuality. Once used as experiments, this technic is starting to be gradually used by more cultural and touristic institutions. Abroad with cities such as Rio de Janeiro or in France with  Lille, Versailles, Cherbourg, Cluny and many other cities or cultural attractions, numerous AR projects have been launched those last years.

But what is this new technology and what does it implies for cultural institutions?

Definition:

The augmented reality we are going to talk about now is the one easy to access for any tourist, which use only and directly customers' own device(s). We are not going to talk about the other systems existing to use AR (e.g. binoculars, Google glasses, etc.) or about its use in Events (another article written by Kate Sampara and Laetitia Vartanian in this blog already dealt with this part last January).

The augmented reality, also called virtual reality in the 80’s, is not really new. First experimentations have been undertaken in USA in the 60’s by Ivan Sutherland. Yet, it is during the 90’s that its use increased significantly in the medical industry. It is now a technology in rapid expansion and reaching numerous industries such as the tourism one. 

The AR is then the superposition of a virtual 2D or 3D reality layer – done thanks to a prior 2D or 3D modelisation of the area – on real pictures/movies taken by a device‘s integrated camera. To ensure a perfect blend between real images and virtual ones, the device positioning needs to be known via geo-localisation.

To do so, users need a device with an integrated camera, internet connection, GPS and an AR software previously downloaded: in short, a smartphone or tablet. However, as described in the Echo Touristique's article “tourisme numérique: les défis de la réalité augmentée” of the 26^th of march 2013, the camera's sensors are not every time necessary. It is the case for instance of the “fake AR” which only uses the geo-localisation of the device. Then, customers doesn’t need any integrated camera but just to position their device where the AR movie has been filmed and an internet access to visualize the reconstitution, like in the case of the Abbey of Cluny (Image 2).

Image 2. Cluny Augmented reality (source: l'Echo Touristique, 2013)

The AR allows mobile or tablet users to experience past centuries as if they were part of it. The Coliseum in Roma, Berlin’s wall, Versailles ‘gardens etc. are all attractions using AR applications bringing back to life ancient time just by pointing equipped devices towards the monuments.

At the opposite of the google glass where the augmented reality is seen through the glasses the user here need to download one of the numerous applications available on smartphone and/or tablet to get access to a specific AR.

Tourism and AR:

• Individual and personalized city tour/ cities as if you were in a museum: new interpretations of attractions

First users of the AR are the tourism industry and the advertising industry mostly linked to the tourism one (such as “Meet the NSW locals” for Destination NSW, Australia. See the video's link below).

Thanks to the increasing number of mobile or tablet applications offering AR tools, the customer is now able to discover a city or a museum by only using its phone/tablet.

For instance, a guided tour in the heart of the city of Lille is available to any smartphone or tablet user willing to download the application Urbik. This one then offers visitors to discover the city on their own and get information about the monuments they are pointing at with their devices. Like in a museum, a label appears then on the screen to let him/her discover the history of the monument and to suggest him/her other parts of the city to discover.

• Bring back to life disappeared monuments/ a new kind of tourism: time travel 

But this technic is not only available for ruins of existing monument. Not known for its fortification sites, Cherbourg (Image 3) has, thanks to the AR, brought back to life a disappeared part of its heritage and then developed a new kind of touristic attraction within its old city.

Born from a partnership between the video company Biplan and the History department of the University of Picardie, value added has been brought to the historic part of the city since it is now possible to discover Cherbourg back 300 years ago, with its fortified castle. Unknown even by its citizen, the city can now promote with the AR a time travel through a very important part of its heritage gone and forgotten for centuries. And Cherbourg is not the only city or touristic place to use this technology. Biplan is also working on a “D-Day Landing beaches” AR project bringing to life an important part of our contemporary history.

More than just offering a new support to do touristic discoveries, AR is about customer involvement. With a personal and unique experience which raises interest and motivation to self-education, AR provides added value through visually enhanced time travels.

Easy to use and downloadable 24/7, it is no wonder that cities and museum followed closely the AR development to promote their cultural and historical heritage.

Image 3. Augmented reality of the Cherbourg's castle. Copyright: Biplan (source: l'Echo Touristique, 2013)

• A clever electronic touristic guide

Finally the AR is also used to help customers to compare or get information about touristic attractions or restaurants. For instance, once in front of three restaurants, pointing your device on them will help you to make your choice thanks to internet connection transmitting directly to your device their main characteristics; prices, menu, internet users’ rate, expositions’ catalogues, history, and so on. In 2011 the application CultureClic already “augmented” 1350 museums and monuments in partnership with la Réunion des musées nationaux and Gallica’s archives from the Bibliotheque Nationale de France.

Costs:

This technology involves different stages and processes. The more you spend time on different stages, the more the project costs. Still in its online article of the 26^th of march 2013, l’Echo Touristique mentioned that a project only based on a 3 minutes long reconstruction-movie by AR will cost around €10 000 to €30 000 (like Cluny’s project). Yet, a more complex project like the one undertaken in Cherbourg will cost around €100 000 due to the elaborate 3D modelisation required, extra historical research and partnerships done with university and AR’s researchers.  It means a rather substantial investment that has to be taken into account seriously in order to maximize its benefits afterwards.

Critics:

Of course this is an application with a program and the innovations are still limited and need to be improved. It is obviously not possible to point at any kind of monument that you would like to get information about, but with the participative characteristic of the web 2.0, added content is likely to increase exponentially. For now this is a good way for a traveller to learn and get information easily about the main monuments and other heritage taking part in the history of a visited place/city.

It also enhances the personal experience from the traveller point of view. Indeed, the involvement of the tourist in the discovery process through these downloadable applications is a new playful and entertaining way to discover differently a touristic area. It increases or improves the added value of a city tour.

Finally, customers don’t have to buy new devices or other audio-visual services to do the visit since they only have to download the application on their own device. Easy to access the service is also easy to use.

From the businesses side, it is also a good and new way to promote and communicate about a destination since the informations are easily broadcasted on the customer devices and through the AR applications. Tourism businesses can then take advantage of their designing power on the application to sponsor and push the user to go to specific places and then gain extra revenue out of this kind of promotion through sponsorships.

This is a way not only to attract history lovers, but also tech-savvy people, keen to play with their device. It is also called as a “gamification” of tourism thanks to this new way to explore places (as mentioned in an article from TourismLink.eu).

Despite a very attractive marketing done through those, most of the time free of charge AR applications (e.g. Versailles’ garden, etc.), some of them still remain available only on Apple devices (e.g. OnSpot). Yet, it is known that almost 75% of the smartphone and 63% of the global tablet markets in 2013 were held by Android (as mentioned in the articles from JDN.com and ZDNET.fr websites). It then limits the impact and the revenue the touristic institution implementing the application could have earned from it.

Interesting for business aiming to get data from customers thanks to personal information required and retained by the applications, this tool can also become dangerous for customers life: for privacy reason first, but also for safety reason since the customer is isolated in its virtual world while wandering in the city to discover it from new “eyes”. Then not totally aware of the real world interactions, accidents could quickly happen.

Finally, this subject is also bringing new concern in the tourism industry since tour guides are afraid to see their roles decrease in the close future due to these new technology tools.

Written by Samantha Pinet & Marisol Bustos Otero.

Sources :

Articles:

•  Realité augmentée histoire – mti.epita: http://www.mti.epita.fr/blogs/2012/10/31/6886/
• Virtual Reality – Culturemobile : http://www.culturemobile.net/quotidien-intelligent/une-histoire-realite-augmentee
• Réalité augmentée - Veille info tourisme: http://www.veilleinfotourisme.fr/realite-augmentee-patrimoine--108732.kjsp
• Réalité augmentée - Revue Espaces tourisme et loisirs 314 : http://www.revue-espaces.com/librairie/8876/revue-espaces-tourisme-loisirs-realite-augmentee-patrimoine-handicap-loisirs-nature.html
• Cherbourg tourisme et réalité augmentée : http://www.cherbourgtourisme.com/actualites/la-visite-du-chateau-fort-de-cherbourg-en-realite-augmentee
• Réalité augmentée au service du tourism – Semablog : http://www.semaweb.fr/blog/e-tourisme/1463-la-realite-augmentee-au-service-du-tourisme
• Forum tourisme numérique Deauville – l’Echo Touristique : http://www.lechotouristique.com/article/deauville-prepare-son-2eme-forum-tourisme-numerique,58738
• L’Echo Touristique – Tourisme Numérique : les défis de la réalité augmentée  : http://www.lechotouristique.com/article/tourisme-numerique-les-defis-de-la-realite-augmentee,55066
• Innovation au service du tourism – i-tourisme : http://www.i-tourisme.fr/2013/03/onspot-la-realite-augmentee-pour-booster-votre-attractivite/
• Application officielle des jardins de Versailles : http://www.chateauversailles.fr/application-iphone
• CultureClic : http://lentreprise.lexpress.fr/publicite-et-communication/realite-augmentee-15-exemples-d-applications-pratiques_30360.html?p=11#content
• TourismLink.eu (2013) – Augmented reality "gamification": http://www.tourismlink.eu/2013/08/the-best-uses-of-augmented-reality-in-the-travel-industry/ 
• JDN - Jaimes, N. (2013) – Journaldunet.com : http://www.journaldunet.com/ebusiness/internet-mobile/android-apple-smartphones-0513.shtml
• ZDNET (2014) – Android tablet market shares: http://www.zdnet.fr/actualites/chiffres-cles-le-marche-des-tablettes-39789571.htm

Images:

• Image 1 – Doctor who’s paintings : http://intbride.blogspot.fr/p/doctor-who-paintings.html
• Images 2 and 3 – L’Echo Touristique – Tourisme Numérique : les défis de la réalité augmentée  : http://www.lechotouristique.com/article/tourisme-numerique-les-defis-de-la-realite-augmentee,55066

Videos:

• AR explained in 2 minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-A1l4Jn6EY
• Cherbourg’s castle AR: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PfvY1UK3ds
• “Meet the NSW locals”, Destination NSW, Australia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0AwUK0XuOHQ
• Lille by Urbik: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ess65AlkH58

How about booking a meeting space for your avatar?

Check out the video link from the title

Coming across this video on YouTube concerning a company that provides software for virtual meetings, it was inevitable not to think about the concerns that it may rise. By using Second Life technology the company can create a totally secure virtual space to host a meeting, event or training program, providing controlled access and ensuring for a unique experience. All that requires is a PC and fast internet connection.

So, what is it that comes to your mind while watching the above video?

“The end of face-to-face meetings”… “The end of corporate travel”…”The end of meeting planning professionalism”…

Actually, it is the beginning of a tremendous usage of technology in implementing new ways of creating experiences in the meetings industry.

The MICE Industry is so far well adopting new technologies, as part of adding value to its business and functionality. However, what is of great importance is that technology has played a unique role in the experience given to the participants/ attendees of the event or meeting.

Despite the fact that the above can seem like an advertising campaign, this is not the reason for uploading it. More than that, it raises issues that many professional event and meeting organizers may look at as a threat coming from the online world.

Virtual reality can add an alternative to face-to-face meetings and events when those last cannot happen for various reasons.

First of all, setting up a virtual meeting is much less expensive than a face-to-face. Cost is saved by the non-existing venue rent and equipment, catering supplies and accommodation, nonetheless, by time and of course the lack carbon emissions.

At this point it is crucial to mention the meeting planner’s role. Everyone agrees that an event is successful as long as it fulfills its objectives, meeting the attendees’ needs and sometimes goes even beyond their expectations. This is the job of the meeting/event planner; to understand and deliver a project that will gratify these needs even through an online virtual reality.

Concluding, event planners should see this as opportunity as well as a tool in their hands to generate experience through their events and meetings, while it would be really interesting to conduct a survey among those who have already attend a meeting in their virtual reality, asking them how wiling they are to actually meet their co-attendees in real life। If the majority marks the box “very willing”, then we have to get our heads down to organize the face-to-face meetings.

Image retrieved on March 27^th, 2011 from http://www.seltra.org/index.php