News

JR Hotel Group announced that LINE, the biggest communication app in Japan, became an option as ‘JR Hotel Members(JRHM)’ pass.

NAVITIME JAPAN, a Japanese navigation app provider, announced regions with more inbound travelers’ visits in the spring 2024, based on data from ‘Japan Travel by NAVITIME.’ The largest growth was seen in Minami Ashigara City.

E-ticket booking platform Linktivity has begun selling QR code-based digital tickets of private railways in Kansai and Kanto areas through partnerships with more than 400 OTAs worldwide.

According to Tokyo Shoko Research, the number of newly launched travel or accommodation businesses in 2023 increased by 59% year on year to 1,560, more than 1,500 for the first time in the past four years.

Hong Kong-based experience booking platform Klook has begun selling ‘Klook eSIM' for 60 countries, which can be activated in its app after purchasing without scanning QR code.

Yamanashi Prefecture and Shizuoka Prefecture, the gateway of Mt.Fuji, will launch management systems to control climbers on July 1 2024, expecting the regulations will be a model case to solve over-tourism.

Location data of climbers to Mt.Fuji is be collected for safe climbing in accordance with a new climbing regulation on the Yoshida Route in Yamanashi Prefecture on July 1 2024.

The number of Japanese outbound travelers was down 34.5% to 941,700 in May 2024 compared to the same month 2019, improving the reduction rate from 46.7% in April 2024.

[PR] The 9th ‘Digital Travel APAC 2024,’ an annual travel-tech summit for APAC, will be organized by Worldwide Business Research (WBR) in Singapore for two days from August 14 2024, joined by more than 200 professionals from the travel industry.

The number of international visitors to Japan in May 2024 was up 9.6% to record-high 3,040,100 for May compared to the same month of 2019. The largest source market was South Korea with 738,800 visitors.

JAL has launched its original platform to match human resources in urban areas with challenges in local areas. The platform helps users search areas, contents, term or budget meeting their own needs.

‘Tourism EXPO Japan 2025’ will be held in Aichi Sky Expo in Aichi Prefecture for the first time, appealing Chubu and Hokuriku areas. Tourism EXPO Japan 2024 will open in Tokyo Big Sight on September 26 2024.

JTB has completed a system linkage between ‘JTB BÓKUN,’ a BtoB activity booking management system, and ‘KEY STATION,’ a remote key delivery system.

APA HOTEL of Japan completed purchase of Hilton Seattle, opening it as ‘Coast Seattle Downtown Hotel by APA’ on June 13. It is the first hotel of APA Group in U.S.

78% of all DMOs or prefectures in Japan target Taiwan as a source market, followed by Australia (51.4%) and U.S. (49.7%), ‘because tourism resources and contents are compatible with the target markets (64.4%).'

The total number of guest nights in April 2024 (provisionally) was up 11.9% year on year to 50.9 million, which were also up 0.5% compared to the same month of 2019, and guest nights of foreigner travelers were up 16.5% to 13.2 million.

NTT Broadband Platform (NTTBP) has begun providing ‘Japan Wi-Fi Funalytics,’ a new service to visualize and analyze inbound travelers’ movements with data from free Wi-Fi access app.

‘Banyan Tree Higashiyama Kyoto,’ the first Banyan Tree brand in Japan, will open on July 26 2024, offering 52 rooms in six different types, including eight rooms with onsen facilities.

Tokyo Shibuya Ward and Honolulu of Hawaii signed a sister city agreement to work together for sharing knowledge and experiences in tourism, eduction, sports and environment.

Club Tourism, a Japanese travel company especially for elder people, targets 30s to 50s females as well as senior people, a core target, for ’solo travel’ tours. Club Tourism marketed more than 1,300 solo travel tours in 2023.