South Florida is starting to court the next big thing in tourism: visitors from China.
Broward and Palm Beach counties are working with state tourism agency Visit Florida to lure Chinese tourists, providing materials for travel trade shows in China and welcoming delegations of Chinese travel agents and press to help spread the word about what South Florida offers.
On a recent Friday, a group of eight Chinese travel writers visited Fort Lauderdale, taking a water taxi tour, shopping on Las Olas Boulevard, as well as sampling shrimp and steak at Shula’s …

Chinese online travel website company eLong Inc. reported its unaudited financial results for the fourth quarter and full year ended December 31, 2009.
Total revenues at eLong.com for the fourth quarter increased 18% year-on-year to CNY106.9 million and net revenues increased 18% year-on-year to CNY100.9 million. Operating income in the fourth quarter was CNY2.4 million compared to operating loss of CNY10.3 million in the prior year period. Net income in the fourth quarter was CNY1.0 million compared to net loss of CNY8.2 million in the prior year period.
Total revenues in 2009 …

The online video business in China is seeing explosive growth, as Chinese consumers learn how to capture and watch video and as Chinese advertisers seek to boost their branding. Several several emerging Chinese companies are scrambling to exploit it — so far, few U.S. companies are there.
Baidu, the leading Chinese search engine company, said today it has raised $50 million from private equity firm Providence Equity Partners to pump into Baidu’s new online video unit. The unit, a separate corporate entity called Qiyi, is licensing premium video content and running ads …

www.chinatraveltrends.com, COTRI and Dragon Trail are inviting all visitors
to the ITB in Berlin to a China Outbound Tourism workshop during the ITB 2010 – March 11th at 4.30pm to 5.45pm in Hall 7.1.
As part of the ITB Convention Destination day the China Outbound Tourism Marketing Forum @
ITB Berlin 2010 will look at “Social Media Tourism Marketing – The Example of China”.
The Chinese Outbound market is one of the few source markets which continued to grow even during the global economic crisis. Social Media are increasingly important especially for the younger, …

China added 86 million users in 2009 to reach a total of 384 million Internet users by December 30, up 28.9% from late 2008, according to a report released January 15 by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC). China added 120 million mobile Internet users in the year to reach a total of 233 million, representing 60.8% of all Internet users, CNNIC said.

Domestic broadband users reached 346 million by the end of 2009, 76 million more than that of 2008. Rural Internet users accounted for 28.7% of the users, …

Local Market Knowledge Helped Baidu, but So Did Piracy, Nationalism and Marketing
HONG KONG (AdAge.com) — Google’s decision to pull out of China unless the authorities will allow uncensored search results — an unlikely outcome — probably does stem from moral outrage over the government’s heavy-handed tactics.
But it could be a face-saving way to exit a market where Google has made surprisingly little progress. Most research companies agree Google controls at most one-quarter of China’s search market. That’s hard to swallow, given Google’s dominant position in the U.S. and many other …

“We actually did an evil scale and decided not to serve at all was worse evil.”
– Google CEO Eric Schmidt on the company’s decision to offer a censored version of its search services in China, Jan. 30, 2006
Before reflecting on the latest news, also take some time to watch Kaifu Lee’s presentation on Youtube about Google’s approach to Google, and the Internet landscape in China – to Carnegie Mellon students in Feb 2008. (Kaifu Lee resigned as CEO of Google China in late 2009)
Evidently Google is taking its informal “don’t …

Spanish Hotelier’s Newest Five Star Property Located In City’s Central Lujiazui District
The Gran Melia Shanghai is Sol Melia’s newest, and first China, five star property
The growth in domestic tourism and business travel in China, as well as sustained demand from international travelers, has brought virtually every major global hotelier to China over the past 20 years. Recently, Shanghai in particular has been the site of a luxury hotel construction boom, as world players fight to finish new properties in time for the Shanghai World Expo, set to take place this …

Event Follows Italian Culture Year In China In 2006
China and Italy have increased their cultural exchanges over the past 5 years
Last summer, Beijing and the Lazio region of Italy announced a cooperative event that featured Chinese novelist Mo Yan as the Chinese “brand ambassador,” and focused on promoting stronger cultural ties between the two governments while bringing more  Chinese and Italian tourists to both regions. Following this event, China and Italy this week announced that “Chinese Culture Year in Italy” will begin in Italy next September.
This “culture year” follows a …

VANCOUVER, Dec. 22 (Xinhua) — Canada needs to be “cautious” about developing its recently acquired Approved Destination Status(ADS) that allows Chinese tour groups to visit the country in providing a complete package to “get it right” and grow the business, according to local tourism officials.
On the occasion of a Canada-China business forum held here Tuesday, Albert Tseng, president of the Canadian Inbound Tourism Association, a non-governmental, non-profit group that works to increase inbound tourism, particularly from Asia Pacific, told Xinhua with the announcement that Canada had received ADS …

Chinese search engine firm Baidu Inc. is launching a new company to provide advertising-supported online video services in China.
The company, which operates the Baidu.com website, will establish a new independent company to provide licensed online video to Chinese Internet users. The new company will work closely with content providers to provide copyrighted premium video content including movies, TV series, sporting events, animation and other varied content to Internet users through an advertising supported model. Yu Gong, formerly president and chief operating officer of China Mobile’s 12580 business, has been appointed …

Number of tourists from China expected to jump by 15 per cent
Tour operators plan to ramp up their marketing efforts in China to cash in on a projected tourism boom following a surprise decision by China to grant Canada so-called “approved destination status.”
The number of visitors from China is expected to immediately jump by 15 per cent as a result of the agreement, which would allow Canada to better market itself to Asian tour groups and operators.
James Wang, owner of Swan Travel, which specializes in Canada-China travel, said approved destination …

A decision by China to bestow approved destination status on Canada will open the gates for tourists from that country, pumping millions of dollars into Canada’s tourism industry, experts say.  It’s a designation that makes it easier for Chinese nationals to visit Canada on tourist visas, not just as students, or for business reasons, as well as allow Canada to advertise as a tourist destination in China and authorize Chinese travel agencies to market and promote leisure group tours for travel in Canada.  Canada is the 135th country to …

Luxury hotel group Kempinski Hotels, is doubling the number of hotels under its management in China over the next three years to capitalize on the nation’s fast economic recovery, said a top company official yesterday.
The German firm is also launching a new five-star hotel brand called Nuo exclusively for the Chinese market.
“We have 11 hotel properties under operation (in China), and we will add 12 more to our line up over the next three years,” said Reto Wittwer, president and chief executive officer of Kempinski.
Although China is still “young” in …

COTRI and Dragon Trail have signed partnership agreement during China International Travel Mart (CITM) in Kunming.

Comprehensive research, social media and other e-marketing activities for the Chinese tourism market.
November 23, 2009. Two leading research and consulting organizations for the Chinese tourism markets have agreed to join forces during the CITM, held in Kunming from November 19-22, 2009. CITM in Kunming is the major tourism event for tourism trade organized by Chinese government officials provides the ideal venue for the start of our cooperation.
Even in times of economic crisis and growing …

Lots of activity in China’s burgeoning online travel industry. Travel search engine Qunar has raised $15 million in funding in a round led by GGV Capital. Mayfield Fund, GSR Ventures, and Tenaya Capital also participated in the round, according to investment research firm JLM Pacific Epoch, which cites local media reports.
The big funding round comes only two weeks after Expedia-subsidiary TripAdvisor bought up rival travel site Kuxun.cn for more than $12 million. Both Expedia and Qunar’s backers are betting that the Chinese travel industry will continue to boom, along with …

According to Japan’s Chunbun “The Chinese Review”, the Japanese government has recently decided to focus on China to attract more foreign tourists and it also plans to use a quarter of its budget in 2010 to attract foreign visitors: a total of JPY5 billion.
Yoshiaki Honpo, the commissioner of the Japan Tourism Agency, told local media that the number of foreign tourists visiting Japan in 2009 is expected decline compared with that of 2008. This will also be the first decrease since the launch of the Visit Japan Campaign in 2003.
The …

CTRIP
Chinese online travel service provider Ctrip.com International Ltd. reports that its net revenues for the third quarter of ended September 30, 2009, were CNY545 million, up 47% year-on-year.
“We are pleased that our team delivered solid results in the third quarter of 2009,” said Min Fan, CEO of Ctrip, “As we celebrate Ctrip’s 10th anniversary of establishment, we want to take this opportunity to thank our customers, our partners and our employees for their supports through the years. In order to extend our leadership in the future, we will continuously focus …

Some employers are blocking social networking sites over fears that employees are spending more time socializing online than they are on their jobs.
The revelation came as a new report from the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) revealed that around one-third of Chinese people regularly met up with online friends in the virtual world.
The CNNIC report said 124 million Internet users in China were using sites including Kaixin001.com and Renren.com. The document said more than half (52.4 percent) of the users were aged between 20 and 29.
Xiao Yu, 28, an …

We are delighted to announce that the 10th Global Travel & Tourism Summit will take place in Beijing, China on 25-27 May 2010. The Summit will be hosted by China National Tourism Administration and the The People’s Government of the Municipality of Beijing and supported by the Summit patrons Beijing Tourism Administration and Beijing Tourism Group.
Jean-Claude Baumgarten,
President & CEO, World Travel & Tourism Council

The WTTC announced its agreement with the Government of China to hold the 2010 Global Travel & Tourism Summit in Beijing from 25-27 May.
“We are very pleased …