WorldHotel-Link

Worldhotel-link.com Limited (trading as WHL or whl.travel) is an online travel-services (accommodation and tour) booking network. The company is incorporated in Hong Kong and has offices in Ho Chi Minh City, Prague, Cape Town, Belo Horizonte, Sydney and Miami.

Background

WHL started in 2002 as a project of the Mekong Private Sector Development Facility (MPDF) which is the technical advisory services arm of the International Finance Corporation (IFC, part of the World Bank Group) in the region covering Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. Given the skills gaps, language difficulties and Internet access problems facing travel service providers in destinations in the developing world, a new online accommodation booking model was needed which bridged the last mile and allowed locally owned travel product to be connected and sold to the global market.

The approach adopted by the WHL project team was to separate all those things that needed to be done locally (i.e. identifying and negotiating contracts with the local travel service providers or processing the booking) from those best done centrally and which the WHL team managed. Local partners, called e-marketplace operators (MPOs), became responsible for collecting and loading local digital content onto the web and keeping it up to date, as well as acting as the interface between travellers and accommodation providers when questions were asked, bookings made etc. The WHL team focused on the technology platform for content management and booking management, as well as global Internet marketing, provision of payment gateways, and management and technical support.

The first pilot site was established in 2002 in Siem Reap, Cambodia, site of the famous Angkor Wat temple complex. The pilot was done with the cooperation of the Siem Reap Angkor Hotel & Guesthouse Association and early success in Siem Reap led to requests for replication from hotel associations, first in Phnom Penh and then in Vientiane, Lao PDR. Sites were also established in Vietnam and, in 2005, WHL started adding destinations outside the Mekong, in Vanuatu, Samoa and Fiji to test the model in other environments. After successful pilots in these countries it was decided to spin the project off from the IFC to allow the model to be moved to the global market. On March 31st, 2006, Worldhotel-link.com Limited was officially made a private company.

The interesting point of departure for WHL from more traditional online tourism bookings businesses is the unique online/offline franchise business model that has been developed out of necessity in order to service the business. The MPO not only owns and operates that actual online booking business in their country, but also has the opportunity to network with other like-minded tourism professionals in other destinations around the world. This local connection network creates a space where an interesting confluence of social networking and business development come together to share best business practices with previously disparate colleagues.

Current Status

After spinning off from the IFC, WHL added tour bookings to the accommodation booking functionality, as well as instant bookings (booking from allotment), last-minute bookings and packaged accommodations and tours. At the end of 2008 WHL had 150 destination sites live in 60 countries. Projections are that by end March 2009 there will be 200 destinations live in 83 countries. WHL continues to work closely with development agencies such as the IFC, World Bank, IADB and USAID in launching destinations sites in many poor and conflict-affected countries/regions around the world.

To undertake consulting and training work associated with tourism development in developing countries WHL launched a consulting business, WHL Consulting, in July 2008 in a joint venture with Geosavvy Development LLC in the USA. WHL has also developed a program called Caring for the Destination as a means to encourage the adoption of sustainable tourism by accommodation and tour providers.

From http://en.wikipedia.org/