SPEAKERS
Founder & CEO
RedDoorz
Amit Saberwal
Amit Saberwal is the Founder and CEO, and the innovator behind RedDoorz, Southeast Asia’s largest and fastest-growing online hotel management and booking platform. Today, the Singapore-based company has grown into a regional powerhouse with operations in Indonesia, Singapore, the Philippines and Vietnam – with a vision to build the region’s leading new-generation multi-brand accommodations platform.
Amit is often perceived to be a hotelier at heart and technologist in action – having spent his early career days in notable hotels in India, namely Sarovar Hotels & Resorts, where he was Regional Sales Manager, before moving on to The Park Hotels. As the Director of Sales and Marketing at The Park Hotels, Amit led the company to a dramatic 100 per cent increase in room revenue within one year, and firmly established the boutique hotel concept in India.
He then ventured into the travel tech scene with India’s largest online travel company, MakeMyTrip.com, where he was the Chief Business Officer – Hotel and International Markets. In his role, he played a key part in the leadership team that was instrumental in shaping the company, growing it to IPO stage in three years and getting it listed on NASDAQ in 2010 with 85,000 properties globally. He was also turnkey in spearheading MakeMyTrip’s largest acquisition of Thailand-based HotelTravel.com.
After two decades in the hospitality and travel tech industry, he identified an opportunity to help both the region’s emerging middle-class consumers and the struggling budget hotel owners. He combined his learnings from his beginnings as a hotelier and experience in the travel tech industry and founded RedDoorz in 2015.
Today, Amit is recognised as one of the key spokespersons in the travel tech and hospitality industry in Southeast Asia. He is often lauded for his vision for disrupting the highly-fragmented affordable hospitality segment and the burgeoning millennial population in Southeast Asia. Under his stewardship, RedDoorz properties can be found in over 200 cities across Southeast Asia and amounts to more than 3,500 properties.
Amit is a Hotel Management graduate with a Post Graduate Diploma in Sales and Marketing from the National Institute for Sales, New Delhi. He also spent time at Cornell University honing his professional skills as a hotelier following that.
VP Strategy, Sabre/
Co-founder, Techsembly
Amy Read
Amy Read is Vice President of Strategy for Sabre Hospitality. Amy joined the Sabre family in July 2023 through the Sabre acquisition of Techsembly, the company she served as CEO and Co-Founder. Within Amy’s role at Sabre, she is responsible for driving alignment across Sabre Hospitality’s strategic pursuits with a focus on accelerating our vision to provide unlimited capabilities for retailing in hospitality.
Amy possesses over two decades of digital, e-commerce, and retail marketing, working with esteemed global brands such as BT and Facebook. Amy also has over 9 years of entrepreneurship, leading her to co-found Techsembly.
Techsembly is a fully automated e-commerce solution enabling global hotels to manage multiple online property stores, products, and logistics on one centralized platform. In addition to its marketplace, Techsembly is a leader in the gift card business for hoteliers, offering highly advanced and configurable capabilities in terms of selling and fulfillment of gift cards.
Executive Chairman & Founder
Orphaned Starfish Foundation
Andy Stein
Andrew Stein founded the Orphaned Starfish Foundation in 2001 to help orphans, victims of abuse, survivors of trafficking, indigenous populations, refugees and at-risk youth worldwide escape their cycles of poverty and abuse through education and job training. From humble beginnings building a small computer vocational training center in an orphanage for young victims of abuse in Santiago, Chile, he has built the Foundation to now serve over 15,000 children in 68 programs in 29 countries: American Samoa, Bolivia, Brazil, Cambodia, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Kenya, Mexico, Nepal, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Puerto Rico, Trinidad, United States & Uruguay. Andy has partnered with local organizations in each of these countries, including Save the Children, Rotary Club, and USAID.
Around the world he is known as Tio Andy or Tio Mago. Andy makes yearly visits to each Orphaned Starfish program. Mago is Spanish for Magician. He brings a magic show complete with balloon animals for all the children. (His highest amount recorded was 1,000 balloon animals in one sitting.) His visits also allow for a personal connection not only to the children but to the institutions and their directors and teachers.
For his work helping the children of the favelas of Brazil, Andy was awarded an Honorary Citizenship in Rio De Janeiro by their Congress. In the United States, he has also been awarded the Jefferson Award for Community Service, the key to the city of Miami Beach, and several other state and local honors. He and the Orphaned Starfish Foundation have been featured on CBS News, Fox News, ABC News, Telemundo and Univision as well as in the Wall Street Journal, Miami Herald, Star Ledger, Jewish Week and US Magazine. Andy has also been a member of the Benefit Committees for Aleh Foundation, National Academy for the Arts, US Doctors for Africa, and Harlem’s Playing 2 Win Foundation. Prior to his work with Orphaned Starfish, Andy was active in Special Olympics, Rotary Club and Counterpart International.
Andy Stein is also currently President and CEO of Makopastreet Partners, LLC. Makopastreet Partners provides senior debt financing for luxury and ultra-luxury hotel, and mixed-use developments, as well as infrastructure projects worldwide. In addition, Makopastreet Partners coordinates all stages of development for luxury and ultra-luxury hotel and mixed-use developments in the Americas, with a focus on the United States, Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean. Andy has been a featured speaker at several industry conferences worldwide and has been a guest professor on the topic of international hotel finance at Wharton for the past several years. From 1993 – 1996, Andy was based in Manila, Philippines as the Joint Head of Corporate Finance for Chase’s (formerly Chemical Bank’s) Manila Branch. During his tenure in Manila, Andy developed the Bank’s project finance and hospitality expertise in the Philippines. Andy also was instrumental in the execution of the Brady Plan bonds, which restructured the bank debt of several Latin American and Asian countries.
Andy holds a B.A. in Economics and International Relations from the University of Virginia. Andy has two sons, both very much involved with Orphaned Starfish Foundation. Andy spends his time between New York City and Miami when not traveling for the Foundation.
Director, Sustainability
Sentosa Development Corporation
Anthony Tan
Mr Anthony Tan is a senior sustainability and supply chain leader with over 20 years’ experience across multiple industries. Anthony is currently Director, Sustainability at Sentosa Development Corporation (SDC) where he is responsible for leading sustainability initiatives for Sentosa, such as solarisation, circular economy, sustainability reporting to social inclusivity.
Anthony also sits on various government and industry sustainability groups, such as the Hotel Sustainability Committee, the MICE Sustainability Committe.
Prior to joining the public service, Anthony served at the National Sustainable Procurement Roundtable as the Head of Secretariat, playing an active industry leadership role in promoting sustainable procurement adoption across sectors.
Anthony holds a Master of Business Administration and a Bachelor of Engineering (Mechanical Engineering) degree, as well as professional certificates in procurement, sustainability, workforce planning.
Content Lead
WiT
Arvindh Yuvaraj
Senior Vice President, Commercial, APAC
Go City
Baidi Li
Baidi Li is the SVP of Commercial in APAC for Go City, where she leads the company’s commercial growth and expansion in the region. In her role, Baidi supports the company’s mission to open access to the top experiences in the world’s best cities. She has built a best-in-class team to expand the product footprint across APAC and deepen localization efforts in new markets. Prior to Go City, Baidi has over 15 years experience with OTA, tour operators, and travel tech companies, from Viator & TripAdvisor’s experience supply team, to operations for Intrepid Travel. Born and raised in China, Baidi has lived and worked in Germany and the US. She currently resides in Singapore with her family.
Founder & CEO
STAYFOLIO
Benny Lee
Sang-muk “Benny” Lee is the founder and CEO of STAYFOLIO, a leading fine-stay curation and booking platfrom. He co-founded the architectural design group Z-LAB in 2011. At Z-LAB, he has led the planning and implementation of several signature projects, including Blind Whale, Changsin Creative House, Waon, and Zero Place.
Benny Lee has over 9 years of hands-on experience in the hospitality industry, ranging from operating Fine Stays to holding high-level managerial positions since the establishment of STAYFOLIO in 2015. Benny believes in the potential of the next generations and, even as CEO, continues to serve as a mentor while simultaneously carrying out various projects related to spaces, all grounded in good taste and lifestyle.
Managing Director, Asia
FCM Travel Solutions
Bertrand Saillet
Bertrand is the Managing Director for the Flight Centre Travel Group in Asia, after being in the role of General Manager for FCM Asia since 2015. Bertrand started his career in the telecom industry in Europe working for Orange and then moved to the aeronautical giant Airbus to lead the sales and marketing department of their IT division. He held multiple global management roles within Amadeus, an IT leader of the travel industry before joining FCM.
Founder, Manna Drone Delivery/
Co-founder, Meili Travel Technology
Bobby Healy
Bobby began his career building video games for Nintendo. He then founded Eland (an airline tech company) which he sold to SITA. He then built CarTrawler over 15 years, and led two successful LBOs for the business. For the last 4 years, he’s been building ‘Manna Drone Delivery’ – a business whose mission is to improve the world by making lightning-fast suburban deliveries affordable, green and safe. He is also a founder of Meili Travel technology with a mission to end the fiasco of car hire brokering.
Managing Director & Vice President, International Markets
Trip.com Group
Boon Sian Chai
Areas of Expertise include: Marketing, Sales, Consulting, Management, Travel, Hospitality, and Technology
Boon Sian Chai currently serves as Managing Director and Vice President of International Markets at Trip.com Group. Based in Singapore, Chai oversees the entire International Hotel Supply team spearheading the growth of supply partners internationally.
Prior to joining Trip.com Group, Chai progressed through the ranks during his more than 14 years in the online travel agency (OTA) space. With an extensive knowledge and in-depth experience of the OTA space, Chai enjoys spending time consulting with hotel partners on their pricing, distribution and marketing strategies. His geographic coverage includes Asia Pacific, having spent time in Hong Kong and Shanghai, and he has extensive networks in these markets.
Before moving into the online travel space, Chai was the COO of an IT startup company specialising in online human resource systems and held corporate planning and e-commerce positions with various enterprises working on strategic planning, business development and sales and marketing.
Chai holds an MBA from the Chicago Booth School of Business and a BSc with first-class honours from Loughborough University.
CEO & Co-founder
GlobalTix
Chan Chee Chong
Chee Chong is passionate about the tourism industry, so much so that his 15-year career has been centered around it. He has founded not one, but two start-ups to better meet the needs of the buoyant travel/tourism industry.
He is currently Chief Executive Officer and visionary of GlobalTix, an e-ticketing travel marketplace. Chee Chong was also one of the co-founders of Adventure Glamping, which has pioneered and built the first-ever “glamping” (glamorous camping) resort called Canopi, located in Bintan.
He began his travel industry career with SilkAir, the regional carrier owned by Singapore Airlines and subsequently was seconded to Singapore Airlines.
During his seven-year career with the two carriers, he handled various job functions, including postings to Thailand, Indonesia, and Central Japan which gave him invaluable exposure in the airline industry. In Central Japan, he started many initiatives, including several that continue to today, and the team was recognized with a CEO’s Merit Award for operational excellence.
Chee Chong next joined Sentosa Development Corporation as a member of the management team. He started as the Leisure Operation, Director where he was responsible for ongoing daily operations, from beach operation, attractions to ticketing and subsequently became the General Manager of Mount Faber Leisure Group.
Chee Chong holds a Bachelor of Engineering (2nd Upper) degree from the National University of Singapore.
CEO
Pan Pacific Hotels Group
Choe Peng Sum
Mr Choe Peng Sum is Chief Executive Officer of Pan Pacific Hotels Group, a member of Singapore- listed UOL Group, one of Asia’s most established hotel and property companies. He oversees nearly 50 properties with more than 14,000 keys across 29 cities in Asia-Pacific, Europe and North America.
Mr Choe has more than 33 years’ experience in the hospitality industry managing and developing hotels and serviced apartments worldwide, and was formerly the Chief Executive Officer of Frasers Hospitality International Ltd. During his 22-year tenure, he grew the portfolio from two properties in Singapore in 1998 to more than 140 properties across more than 76 cities worldwide. His last appointment was Senior Advisor to Frasers Property Limited.
As CEO of Pan Pacific Hotels Group, Mr Choe is responsible for the expansion of the Group’s hotels and serviced apartments under its Pan Pacific, PARKROYAL COLLECTION and PARKROYAL brands. He is in charge of their performance, operations, marketing and brand standards, as well as the business development of the hotels and serviced suites.
Mr Choe started his hospitality career with Westin and subsequently Shangri-La International in 1981, where he was awarded the Shangri-La overseas scholarship. He graduated from Cornell University (Ithaca, New York) with a Bachelor of Science with Distinction. He was awarded the National Dean’s List (USA) as well as the Phi Kappa Phi for academic excellence.
Managing Director
Thayer Ventures
Chris Hemmeter
Chris has spent his entire professional life in and around startups and high-growth businesses in travel, hospitality and technology having founded six companies during his 30 years in business. Today he is a co-founder and Managing Director of Thayer Ventures, a venture capital firm investing in emerging technology companies in the travel and transportation space. Immediately Prior to Thayer Ventures, Chris was founder and President of iCare Marketing (sold to Sysco Foodservice Corporation in 2012) and founder and CEO of Dynamic Payment Ventures (sold to Elavon, a subsidiary of US Bank in 2007).
Prior to that, Chris was founder and CEO of CriticalArc Technologies, a supply-chain software provider to the foodservice industry, founder of E&O Kitchen and Bar, a casual dining restaurant based in San Francisco, founder of The Hemmeter Collection, a direct response retailer and founder of Hemmeter Publishing, a publisher and distributor of travel books and content. Upon graduating from Cornell University in 1986, Chris joined Hemmeter Investment Company, a real estate developer of destination-resort properties. Founded by his father in 1962, the Hemmeter organization developed major destination resort hotels in Hawaii and operated several related hospitality and travel businesses in the foodservice, gaming, retail and aviation sectors.
Chris received his undergraduate degree magna cum laude from Cornell University and his graduate degree from Harvard Business School in 1995, where he was recognized as a Baker Scholar for his academic achievement.
Managing Director
ATTIA
Chris Kerin
Founder & President
RTM Association (Redefine Tourism Mixer), Taiwan
Daniel Cheng
The Founder and President of RTM Association (Redefine Tourism Mixer), the biggest community of travel start-ups and tourism tech entrepreneurs in Taiwan. Used to work in Hong Kong MICE industry and Hawaii Tourism Authority, experienced in cross-border travel marketing, B2B partnership management, event curating, media and PR.
RTM was founded in 2014, numerous seminars and forums were organized for start-up companies’ demonstration and incubation, advocating new tech innovation on government policies, as well as operational know-how education including young talent development programs.
Joined with over 200 industrial consultants, RTM aims at becoming the most influential tourism association in Taiwan, devoting to the long-term destination branding for the island.
APAC General Counsel
Airbnb
Darrell Chan
‘Lawyering for a 21st century company looks very different from what we were taught in law school. It requires lawyers being entrenched in the business, standing shoulder to shoulder with the teams, and having a deep understanding of the issues that challenge the company – I call this guerrilla lawyering’. So says deputy general counsel and Asia Pacific legal team lead of Airbnb Darrell Chan, who himself is a prime example of the sort of modern in-house lawyer he is describing. Indeed, after serving as a private practice lawyer at the start of his career with Drew & Napier and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, he took what he called ‘a road less travelled’ by taking on a purely commercial role with fashion retail group F J Benjamin before becoming the general counsel of the company – he thrived in this role for a number of years, eventually leaving in 2012. A senior legal role with BASF was then followed by head of legal positions with Expedia and Discovery Communications before moving on to Airbnb in 2018; clearly Chan has had an extremely varied career with in terms of the roles he has taken on and the sectors in which his companies have operated. Now well established at Airbnb, Chan has been at the centre of some blockbuster transactions, of which he provides some more detail: ‘Airbnb has been closely working with the Japanese government over the past 3 years to implement the new law around short-term rentals, which came into effect in June 2018. The Japanese government has formally introduced this new form of short term rental accommodation to support its growth in tourist arrivals ahead of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics’. He has also been at the forefront of a number of initiatives within the team, including a focus on career and leadership development, work-life balance and enhancing the speed and clarity of advice given. This fits in with his overall philosophy of in-house legal work. ‘Contrary to the flowery legalese taught in law school’, he explains, ‘communication has to be crisp, clear and concise with almost military precision’.
Co-founder & CEO
Squadtrip.com
Darrien Watson
Vice President, Ecommerce & Marketing
Go City
Dawn Jeremiah
Over the last 15+ years, Dawn has held roles in travel, marketing, technology, media and TV broadcasting in San Francisco, Kuala Lumpur, Hong Kong and Singapore. Her foray into travel and tourism began at a digital and content marketing agency handling various airline and tourism clients before joining KAYAK under Booking Holdings. Now, she oversees all things marketing and ecommerce in APAC for Go City®, the global leader in sightseeing passes which includes brands like London Pass ®, New York Pass ®, Paris Pass ™, along with a growing list of 30+ cities globally.
Dawn’s current remit sees her leading B2C customer growth and ecommerce sales focusing on Greater China, North Asia, India and Australia. She joined Go City® six months before the pandemic hit, pioneered customer localization in the company, steered her team through travel recovery and is now leading the APAC customer growth beyond pre-pandemic levels.
She enjoys a good city break, cultural immersions, museum-hopping and deep-sea wreck diving.
Vice President, Commercial
COMO Hotels & Resorts
Doris Goh
Doris has an illustrious career spanning more than 25 years in the hospitality industry.
She was the first Asian woman to serve as education chairperson at the Association of Corporate Travel Executives (ACTE) for Asia as well as their representative on the Asia Pacific Council.
A well-respected professional, her work earned much recognition, which bagged the ACTE President’s Award in 2002 for her regional contributions. March 2009 saw Harper’s Bazaar Japan profiled her work in their story on ‘successful Asian career women’. In September 2013, Hotelier India had her in their 2013 Power 100 List of the Top 100 “Most Influential People in the Hospitality Industry”. Last August 2016, CMO ASIA named her one of Asia’s 50 Woman Leaders to bag the Leadership Excellence Award.
Doris was the first person appointed at Alila Hotels and Resorts Corporate Office to drive sales & marketing and to grow the brand in 2003. As one of the pioneers in boutique luxury, she successfully positioned brand Alila as one of the top 4 luxury brands in the world. In 2017, the brand clinched Telegraph UK’s Best Luxury Hotel Group of the year. Following the Alila success story came the acquisition of Two Roads Hospitality by Hyatt Hotels Corporation in November 2018.
Co-founder & COO
Klook
Eric Gnock Fah
Eric’s visionary leadership has fueled Klook’s remarkable growth, diversifying its product offerings and pioneering marketing innovation, resulting in global popularity. This remarkable journey has garnered support and investments from an esteemed bench of renowned investors including Sequoia Capital, Matrix Partners, Softbank, Aspex, Goldman Sachs, TCV, and more.
A Mauritius native and educated in the United States, Eric is an avid explorer with a multicultural upbringing that taught him to speak seven languages. He was featured on Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia 2017 List and China’s Yicai (CBN) Brilliant 20 List, recognizing his entrepreneurial spirit and game-changing attitude. Prior to co-founding Klook, Eric worked in finance at a global investment bank in Hong Kong.
CEO
Greenview
Eric Ricaurte
Eric founded Greenview in 2008, an international consultancy and data intelligence firm catalyzing innovation and best practice in sustainability and ESG, providing services for strategy, programs, data management, benchmarking, and reporting. Greenview’s clients include most of the world’s largest hotel companies as well as hotel owners and developers, event organizers, cruise lines, NGOs, DMOs, OTAs and industry organizations including the WTTC, UNWTO, and AHLA. With over 25 years of hands-on experience, Eric is a frequent speaker, convener, and researcher on the topic of sustainability. His notable industry work includes launching the Cornell Hotel Sustainability Benchmarking Index, Green Lodging Trends Report, Destination Water Risk Index, Hotel Global Decarbonisation Report, Hotel Owners for Tomorrow Coalition, and Net-Zero Methodology for the Hotel Industry. Eric is a member of the UFI Committee on Sustainable Development, the International Standards Committee of the Global Sustainable Tourism Council, and the Board of Advisors of the Phuket Hotels Association. Prior to founding Greenview, Ericspecialized in the operations and development of nature-based lodges, theme parks and attractions in Costa Rica, Mexico, and Brazil. Eric earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the Cornell University School of Hotel Administration and a Master of Science degree in Tourism & Travel Management from New York University. He has held a research fellowship at the Cornell University Center for Hospitality Research and been an adjunct instructor at New York University.
Co-founder & CEO
Klook
Ethan Lin
Growing up in the US, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and mainland China, Ethan developed a lifelong passion for travel that has taken him to explore over 50 countries to date. Prior to founding Klook, Ethan started his career in 2008 at Citi’s Investment Banking division. He played an integral role in deals valued at over US$20 billion across Asian markets, specializing in the hospitality and real estate sectors.
Under Ethan’s leadership, Klook has achieved remarkable growth and has quickly become the market leader across Asia Pacific. This impressive journey has garnered substantial support and investment from an illustrious roster of renowned investors, including Sequoia Capital, Matrix Partners, Softbank, Aspex, Goldman Sachs, TCV, and more.
SVP, Customer Success Management Asia Pacific
Amadeus
Frederic Barou
CEO
Queen's Road Capital
Fritz Demopoulos
Fritz Demopoulos has been an entrepreneur and investor in the Chinese media and internet industries for over a decade. He is currently the Founding Partner at Queen’s Road Capital, an early-stage venture fund focused on emerging markets. Fritz is a founder of Qunar.com, China’s largest travel portal, which was listed on the NASDAQ in 2013 and acquired by Ctrip in 2015. Qunar means “where are you going?” in mandarin Chinese. Prior to Qunar, Fritz co-founded Shawei.com, China’s largest sports portal. Shawei means “brave shark” in Chinese. The company was acquired by Hutchison Whampoa-affiliate Tom.com.
He also had senior executive roles at Netease and The News Corporation Limited. A native of Southern California, Fritz was educated at UCLA, Cal State Fullerton, the University of Heidelberg in Germany, and the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He has lectured frequently on entrepreneurship and the Chinese market at Stanford, Harvard, Tsinghua, Beijing University, UCLA and the Communist Party College in Nanjing. He is a supporter of the Arsenal Gunners of the English Premier League.
Co-founder
TBO.COM
Gaurav Bhatnagar
Gaurav Bhatnagar is the Executive Director of TBO.COM. He holds a bachelor’s degree of technology in computer science and engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi and worked at Microsoft Corporation. He is member of the Executive Committee World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) and is one of the co-founders of TBO. He is also a co-founder of Tekriti Software Private Limited.
Managing Director, Global Business Development for Travel & Local
Google
Gianni Marostica
Gianni has been at Google for 12 years, and currently leads the Global Business Development team, responsible for all Travel and Local products. This entails Flight Search, Hotel search, Things to do, Food (restaurants and food ordering) and other local verticals including the Flight enterprise Travel products. Gianni has over 25 years of Travel Industry experience in the Airline, Hotelier, and OTA areas including two Software sectors. . Prior to Google, Gianni served as Chief Commercial Officer at ITA Software, a privately held startup in Cambridge, MA, offering pricing and shopping solutions to the industry. Gianni also served as President, Airline Passenger Solutions at Sabre Holdings Corp , providing mission critical and decision support software solutions to suppliers and intermediaries. He also served as the Managing Partner for Worldwide Consulting..
In addition , Gianni also held several international assignments in Montreal, Paris, and Rome where he participated in or led the turnaround efforts for the privatization of three companies. He graduated with an MBA from the John Molson School of Business at Concordia in Montreal, Canada where he was born. Gianni currently serves on the board of a non-profit, a biotech startup and is involved in mentoring students in various university programs.
Senior Vice President, Strategic Travel Partners
Expedia Group
Greg Schulze
Greg Schulze is a Senior Vice President at Expedia Group, representing some of the best brands in travel, including Expedia, Hotels.com, Travelocity, Orbitz, Hotwire, Wotif, and Expedia Cruises. His team manages all global relationships with Expedia Group’s travel partners, covering lodging, air, ground transportation, activities, and cruise.
Greg joined Expedia Group in 2005 to lead its air reporting and analysis practices. He subsequently assumed responsibility for revenue management, building on his days at American Airlines, where he led the airline’s internet pricing strategy. At Expedia Group, he has held a wide variety of leadership positions for strategy, commercial, operations, and analytics.
Greg was appointed by the U.S. Secretary of Commerce to the U.S. Travel and Tourism Advisory Board. He is a respected leader and collaborates regularly with the highest levels of the travel industry.
He spent five years in Singapore before recently relocating back to the United States. Greg served as a director for AirAsia Expedia and is currently on the board of directors of Traveloka and the US-ASEAN Business Council. He is the current Executive Sponsor for the employee group, “Asian Community at Expedia”.
Greg holds a bachelor’s degree in engineering from Northwestern University and a Master of Business Administration from the University of North Carolina.
Sector Lead, Travel & Vertical Search APAC
Google
Hermione Joye
Hermione is a leader with 15 years’ experience in sales, marketing, strategy and business development in the technology & travel sector.
Hermione leads the APAC Travel team for Google’s Large Customer Sales business, working with leading online travel agents, airlines, hotel chains & vacation rental companies to develop digital business strategy & products for Asian consumers. Additionally she oversees the APAC Vertical search team, who help clients adopt our more technical solutions such as Hotel Ads, and work with our Product & Engineering team to build products for our region. Prior to this, Hermione worked in Google’s Sydney office managing major Retail clients.
Before her time at Google, she worked in the TV industry for 4 years, working for 7media West running the Key Accounts team. When she launched her career she started in Creative Advertising working initially for M&C Saatchi and then TBWA in Sydney.
Hermione was educated in Sydney Australia, completing a degree in Economics & Social Sciences from Sydney University and was awarded the Young Citizen of the Year (2009) by the Woollahra Mulinciptilty.
Hermione now lives in Singapore, and has done so for six & a half years. She is a mum to three young children and a Red Kelpie, and is an incredibly passionate traveler.
Co-founder & CEO
ZYTLYN Technologies
Houman Goudarzi
Houman is the Co-Founder and CEO of ZYTLYN Technologies, focused on predictive travel technology solutions and insights, to help companies augment commercial planning and operations.
He started his career at Cisco Systems as a software engineer, later on he moved more towards product development. Prior to the founding of ZYTLYN, he was the Global Head of BI and New Product Development at the International Air Transport Association (IATA), where he was responsible for both commercial data product activities, as well as aviation industry engagement.
Houman is an aerospace engineer, and visiting lecturer of data science in business at the U Business School.
Founder & CEO
Get Direx
Ibukunoluwa Salau
Ibukunoluwa Salau is the Founder and CEO of Direx, a travel-tech startup building an all-in-one cloud-based business management solution tailored specifically for tourism and hospitality business owners in Africa. We oer a range of digital tools and technologies including a robust payment and booking engine, an integrated back and front-oce management system, a user-friendly website builder, and more. Our mission is to enable these businesses to seamlessly adapt to and thrive within the digital landscape while maintaining direct connections with customers and navigating their growth trajectory on their own terms.
Ibukunoluwa, a technologist, has extensive experience in the development of digital products, having been involved in the tech startup ecosystem since 2017 in a wide range of capacities. Prior to Direx, Ibukunoluwa was the co-founder of Afriktrip, an online marketplace designed to help tourists discover and book from a selection of over 3000 single and all-inclusive vacation packages, as well as an array of engaging activities spanning 28 African countries. His work has been featured in a variety of tech and media outlets both locally and abroad, including Disrupt Africa, ProductHunt, Phocuswire, Startup.info, BenjaminDada, TechBuild Africa, and Web in Travel.
He is a passionate advocate of using technology to tackle Africa’s challenges. He strongly believes that technology and entrepreneurship have a vital role in the long-term success and advancement of the African continent, especially for the younger generation. Adding to Ibukunoluwa’s impressive journey, he holds a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from the esteemed Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta, Ogun State, Nigeria.
Global Lead – Travel, Transport, Leisure & Automotive
Stripe
James Lemon
Millions of companies—from the world’s largest enterprises to the most ambitious startups—use Stripe’s financial infrastructure solutions to accept payments, grow revenues, and accelerate new business opportunities, including Airbnb; Uber; Booking.com; 75% of the 2022 Forbes Cloud 100 and many of the largest internet companies, from Amazon to Zoom, Shopify and Doordash. Stripe is a Silicon Valley success story, processing nearly $1tr across 3m customers, and a leader in payment and financial technology, now ranked among world’s most valuable private companies.
As Global Lead for Travel, Leisure, Transport & Automotive, James ensures potential & existing Stripe customers benefit from improved customer experiences, innovate faster & build more productive operations.
Prior to Stripe, James had 15 years of travel industry experience, including founding & exiting mentoring & peer-to-peer platform start-up, Otolo, and working across the travel industry including hotels, property management, tech, and advising start-ups & Private Equity.
James is a regular passionate speaker in travel, having spoken at Websummit, Phocuswright, Travolution, Mews Unfold, HEDNA, and many industry webinars and podcasts. His previous industry experience includes Hostmaker, as COO of the short stay property management company that launched Marriott Homes & Villas, plus leading commercial and strategy teams for hotel chains (IHG) and traveltech (Travelport). James is also kept busy as a father of 2 and based in Wimbledon in the UK.
Executive Vice President, Travel Unit & Managing Director, Asia Pacific
Amadeus
Javier Laforgue
Javier Laforgue is Executive Vice President, Travel Unit & Managing Director, Asia Pacific at Amadeus. Javier is responsible for Amadeus’ airlines and travel seller business and leads development across the company’s portfolio of solutions in the Asia Pacific region.
Javier has more than 20 years of experience at Amadeus in various senior management roles. Most recently, as global head of Air Distribution, Javier achieved an extensive list of accomplishments in addition to managing Amadeus’ NDC (New Distribution Capability) strategy and investment program. Prior to that, Javier was instrumental in establishing the global sales function and headed the Latin America region as well as the expansion of Amadeus’ activities in key growth areas such as payments.
Javier is a Spanish national and holds a Master of Business Administration from IE Business School. He is married with two sons. His hobbies include cooking, playing tennis and running.
CEO & Founder
Tripbtoz
Jiha Jung
Jiha Jung is a Korea market expert who has built his career in different industries over the last nine years, ranging from IT to travel. He started his career as an ERP IT consultant at Hyundai where he was specialized in a financial integration. At Expedia, Jihacultivated relationships with local travel associations and tourism boards to increase the affinity for the brand, and managed a portfolio of top partners in an effort to build sustainable online market shares. He now owns and operates the online travel agency Tripbtoz Inc. based in Seoul, South Korea. Jiha holds a master of management in hospitality degree from Cornell University.
Chief Growth Officer
amp
Joerg Becker
Joerg is a Senior Executive and Management-Consultant with over 25 years of international experience in dynamic and highly competitive market environments.
He has held general management positions and various executive roles in growth management, primarily at multiple international IT and Telecommunications companies. He has a proven track record in restructuring and repositioning critical business areas and implementing consistent and sustainable transformation and change processes.
Over the past ten years, Joerg has also been an independent management consultant responsible for international projects in various dynamic industry sectors in Europe and South East Asia. Furious about human capital and its strategic value to organizational success, his interests lie in deeply understanding transformation, individual and organizational behavior, and the interrelationship between personality, leadership style, culture, and decision-making.
Joerg has a passion around the topic of “Everyday Aesthetics”. That encompasses his enthusiasm for contemporary art, design, and crafts. He loves to travel and enjoys the variety of experiences one can gain on a journey. Good food is also a genre to which he dedicates much time with friends and family.
One topic, in particular, has shaped his professional career in recent years. Specifically, the increasing knowledge of how sound can influence emotions and specific behavior of humans is becoming highly relevant in the context of digitalization. That subject is increasingly relevant for the brand perception of large international brands in the B2C but also B2B environment along the customer journey.
He joined the company amp sound branding as Chief Growth Officer three years ago, which is one of the most successful sonic branding agencies worldwide and serves some of the biggest labels in the world, including Mastercard and Mercedes Benz. WPP Group has recently acquired amp.
Vice President, Commercial South East Asia & Korea
IHG Hotels & Resorts
Joff Romoff
Joff Romoff is Vice President, Commercial, South East Asia and Korea for IHG Hotels & Resorts (IHG).
In this role, Joff is responsible for driving high commercial performance and delivering a strong strategic road map for the business.
With more than 25 years in the travel industry with wide-ranging experience across commercial disciplines including global sales, revenue management, distribution, loyalty management, product development and data analytics, Joff a highly experienced team leader and have managed large teams across multiple geographies.
Prior to joining IHG, he was Head – Global Travel Supplier and Partner Management at SAP Concur, where he was responsible for all commercial aspects of the global portfolio of accommodation, payment and aviation segments.
Prior to that he was Vice President, Commercial Distribution for Amadeus, where he was responsible for the North American commercial organisation, and before that Vice President, Market Management at Expedia, where he led a $3.9 billion lodging portfolio comprising of more than 100 colleagues and defined the strategic direction of this culturally diverse account management organisation.
Joff graduated from Ryerson University with a business degree and obtained his Executive Education at the University of Toronto – Rotman School of Management. He lives in Singapore with his wife Tara.
Vice President, Strategy & Partnerships
Spotnana
Johnny Thorsen
Johnny Thorsen is Spotnana’s VP of Partnerships. He is a global technology evangelist in the corporate travel and mobile world with proven ability to start new businesses and develop new services within large companies. His 30+ years of experience in the travel industry includes writing code, marketing new products and services, and driving disruptive innovation for key industry players including GetThere, Sabre, Travelport, conTgo, Concur, SAP, Mezi, and American Express Digital Labs.
Johnny has a degree in software development and systems architecture from EDB Skolen, København. He began his travel industry career as a software developer in his native Denmark, landing at a company that developed back-office systems for travel agencies. Over the years, Johnny has negotiated and closed “impossible deals” between global enterprise buyers, startup suppliers, and major established industry players
Managing Director/ Co-CEO
Yanolja Cloud
Jongyoon Kim
Jong Yoon Kim is the Managing Director/ Co-CEO of Yanolja Cloud, leading all strategic management of businesses regarding domestic/international accommodation and leisure activity platforms and cloud-based hospitality solutions. He also oversees the company’s ongoing expansion efforts with responsibility for investment attraction & corporate acquisition strategies.
As a digital professional and business strategy expert, Kim is leading the company to grow 2X bigger per year while spearheading the digital transformation of travel and leisure industry.
Prior to joining Yanolja in 2015, Kim worked across several innovative brands and sectors including 3M, Google, and McKinsey & Company
Founding Member & Managing Director
Weeva
Julie Cheetham
Julie is a skilled sustainability consultant with experience spanning over 20 years. Her focus lies in sustainable development and business transformation.
Learnings over the course of her career led Julie to be part of the initial group of thought leaders who found Weeva – a SaaS platform that will enable the travel industry to adopt a measurable and holistic sustainability practice that goes beyond pledges and marketing ploys and recalibrates operations for improved performance and positive impact – in 2021. Weeva launched to market in January 2023.
Prior to this Julie advised a diverse range of clients on their sustainability journey, including the Grootbos Private Nature Reserve, Wolwedans, The Long Run, National Geographic, Tswalu Kalahari, Fireblade Aviation, and Oppenheimer Generations. However, she has also worked on transformation and sustainability at well-known corporate institutions such as Standard Bank, Distell, BMGi, the National Australia Bank, and National Geographic.
Julie holds a Bachelor’s degree in Commerce (NMMU) coupled with a post-graduate certificate in Executive Development (GIBS), Six Sigma (Black Belt), and Program Management Certifications. She is a member of NOW Partners – a global partnership of over 100 senior business leaders united to accelerate the economic evolution of business for good.
Senior Vice President, Product & Technology
Expedia Group
Karen Bolda
As Senior Vice President of Product and Technology, Karen Bolda is responsible for product and technology strategy and delivery, enabling businesses to leverage travel solutions for their customers.
Karen is an experienced business leader, product and technology strategist, and B2B growth expert. She has led teams in designing, building, and bringing to market industry-leading travel solutions in the form of APIs, as well as template products within Expedia Partner Solutions. With a background in software engineering, Karen brings a unique perspective to B2B travel and enabling businesses for third party demand partners. Karen holds a Masters in Computer Information Systems from Missouri State University.
Co-founder & CEO
Venture Republic – TRAVEL.jp & Trip101
Kei Shibata
Travel & technology entrepreneur based in Singapore and Tokyo with 20+ years of experience. He led his company to an IPO, a MBO, two exits and one acquisition.
As a founding CEO, Kei is running Venture Republic that owns a group of online travel businesses across Asia and the rest of world, including “TRAVEL.jp”, Japan’s largest travel metasearch & travel guide media, “TRAVEL jp for Business”, a chat based corporate travel management service in Japan, and “Trip101”, Singapore based global online travel guide media that curates world’s best short-term rentals, accommodations and destinations.
In 2008, he took the company public in Japan (2177. JASDAQ) after 7 years in operation. In 2018, company made a strategic partnership with LINE Corporation, one of the leading messaging apps in Asia.
He received the “WiT Hall of Fame” award in 2019 which honors individuals who have had the greatest influence on the progress and professionalism of the digital travel industry in Asia Pacific.
Angel investor in the travel & technology space. Serving as a board of director for various startups including BeMyGuest, Singapore.
As a co-founder/organizer, he also runs WiT Japan & North Asia, a leading international conference in North Asia focusing on technology & travel industry.
Harvard MBA. Chairman of Keio University’s alumni association for startup founders/CEOs.
Avid Nordic cross country & alpine skier/snowboarder. Love jazz, coffee and working from vacation homes.
CEO & founder
KabuK Style Inc
Kenji Sunada
Born in Okawa City in Fukuoka Prefecture in 1984, Kenji graduated from Nagasaki Kaisei High School. After graduating from Tsukuba University in 2006, he then joined Nikko Cordial Securities Inc. (presently SMBC Nikko Securities). Since 2011, he served as Head of ECM Syndicates at Deutcsch Bank where, with a primary focus on underwriting, he engaged in areas such as equity-related structured finance, derivates and repackaged notes, etc.
Assistant Chief Executive, Marketing Group
Singapore Tourism Board
Kenneth Lim
Chief Commercial Officer, Premium, Midscale & Economy Division - Middle East, Africa, Turkey & Asia Pacific
Accor
Kerry Healy
Kerry Healy is the Chief Commercial Officer for Accor’s Premium, Midscale & Economy division in the Middle East, Africa, Turkey & Asia Pacific. Kerry oversees the commercial function for this diverse region which comprises close to 900 hotels under iconic brands such as Pullman, Mövenpick, Swissôtel Novotel, Mercure and ibis. Based in Singapore, Kerry leverages her wealth of business acumen and over 25 years of hospitality experience to ensure all functions of the organisation are aligned to meet the Group’s strategic commercial objectives.
Kerry is an outstanding leader and a skilled negotiator who has a deep understanding of distribution, customer relationship management, partnerships and operations. With strong international experience across four continents, her commercial insight and wide connections play a key role in aligning Accor’s commercial strategy and driving increased revenue in an increasingly complex environment.
Kerry has a long history of managing teams to excellence through change, building trust and designing exciting robust strategies. She fosters a customer centric organisational culture based on quality, respect and trust.
With expertise spanning multiple continents, Kerry has held senior management positions in the UK, Middle East, Asia and the Pacific Rim.
Vice President, Sales, Global Travel Technology Group
Northstar Travel Media
Kimberly Newbury
As vice president of sales for Northstar Travel Media Singapore, Ms. Newbury heads up commercial and strategic efforts for the Global Travel Technology Group including partnerships with some of the leading brands in travel.
In her role with the Global Travel Technology Group, Kimberly and team leverage the strength of their brands to share market intelligence, research insight, craft positioning strategies through media and events and enable C-level connections to drive the travel tech industry forward. Kimberly led the launch of the Women’s Leadership Initiative and the Diversity in Leadership Initiative and was a key contributor to mentorship programs. She continues to cultivate partnerships that support these projects engendering connection and promoting professional development in the travel industry.
Prior to moving to Singapore for this role, Kimberly has held leadership roles in Phocuswright as well as other B2B intelligence-companies in the United States and United Kingdom. Kimberly started her career in the travel industry focused on economic development work in the then-emerging Central European region from a base in Prague, Czech Republic. She holds a B.A. in Journalism from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Chief Executive Officer
Montara Hospitality Group
Kittisak Pattamasaevi
Kittisak (Kitt) Pattamasaevi is the Chief Executive Officer for Montara Hospitality Group. Montara owns and manages Phuket’s most exclusive pool villa beach resort TRISARA, Bangkok’s only river mansion boutique hotel PRAYA PALAZZO, and the innovative movie house-turn-hotel PRINCE THEATRE HERITAGE STAY in Bangrak.
In his previous role at Montara, Kitt leveraged his private equity and investment banking experience to facilitate the acquisition of boathouse, a critically acclaimed Phuket beach resort and restaurant, which Montara also currently owns and manages.
Kitt received his MBA from Harvard Business School. At HBS, he served as COO for Hospitality & Travel Industry Club. Prior to that, he graduated Cum Laude from Columbia University with a Bachelor of Science in Operations Research. Outside of his work at Montara, Kitt serves as a director of Niyom Pattamasaevi Foundation, which sponsors scholarships and supports rural elementary schools in Northern Thailand.
Senior Vice President Corporate Development
Etraveli Group
Lisa Katsouraki
Lisa is heading Corporate Development and M&A activity for Etraveli Group, one of the leading global flight centric OTAs. The Group is backed by CVC Capital Partners and has offices in Sweden and Greece. It operates in 50+ countries through brands such as Gotogate, Supersaver and Mytrip and enjoys top positions in the Nordics, Southeastern Europe as well as in the Middle East through trip.ae. It also operates flygresor.se, the #1 metasearcher in Sweden. We are a team of more than 600 people.
Lisa has been working in the travel industry since 2011. She joined e-Travel, a South East European OTA in 2012. As part of e-Travel’s management team she helped grow revenues 3x and the business from a team of 60 to c.200 employees until the company joined forces with Etraveli in 2017 and was welcomed into the CVC family. Prior to joining e-Travel she was a venture capitalist investing in e-commerce. She started her career in advertising. Whether it’s being the link between the creatives and the customer, software engineers and customer needs, or between investors and entrepreneurs she has been performing “translation” duties for 15 years. She holds a BSc in Economics from LSE and and an MBA from INSEAD.
Head of ESG
Traveloka
Loic Dujardin
Loic is currently the Head of ESG at Traveloka, Southeast Asia’s travel and lifestyle platform. He spearheads Traveloka’s ESG and sustainability efforts.
Prior to joining Traveloka, Loic worked in the ESG investment industry for 17 years. He was previously the Head of ESG at Fullerton Fund Management, where he designed and implemented the Fund’s ESG investment strategy. He also held roles such as, Managing Director for Asia Pacific at Sustainalytics, a global leader in ESG and corporate governance research and ratings, as well as senior analyst at Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM). Loic started his career as an ESG analyst at Amundi.
He holds a master’s degree in International Law from the Université Panthéon Assas (Paris II), as well as an Economic and Finance master’s from the University of Paris I: Panthéon-Sorbonne. Loic is currently based in Singapore.
Investor & Advisor
Louise Daley
Louise is an experienced Chief Executive and Board Member driving strategy and outcomes across enterprise and consumer businesses in Asia Pacific.
After 30 years in the commercially complex Hospitality Industry growing the Accor Hotels footprint in Asia Pacific to over $10 billion in revenues, she joined Future Now Capital as Partner and CEO. Future Now Capital is a VC fund providing growth equity to scale up enterprise technology businesses, in partnership with and dedicated to Microsoft.
She’s now an independent investor and advisor, keeping a close eye on travel and hospitality developments and investments for clients, with a particular focus on hospitality and food tech.
As Himself
Martin Symes
Prior to starting his own consultancy, Martin Symes was Chief Marketing Officer of Sabre Travel Network Asia Pacific, where he led product development and content marketing for travel agencies and suppliers, as well as corporate and marketing communications.
Martin has more than 20 years of travel industry experience, starting with leading airlines and moving into the online travel space.
He was a key member of the team involved in bringing Priceline’s buyer-driven e-commerce model to Asia. Martin then became the executive director, commercial at ZUJI, the Asia Pacific subsidiary of Travelocity.com. More recently, he was CEO of Wego.com, a leading travel metasearch engine.
Martin earned a master’s degree in Geography at Oxford University and gained an MBA from the London Business School.
CEO & Founder
Atlas
Mary Li
Mary Li has built her startup career in solving flight problems and is back with a new startup, The Atlas, which is a global airfare aggregator, offering unique content from low-cost carriers and domestic airlines. Before that, she was co-CEO of Mystifly where she managed its product, technology, operations, human resource, and APAC Sales from Bangalore, India. Her first flight startup was ASLAN, which she ran for eight years, building it from a 40-person offline travel agency into the largest B2B air ticket platform in China. In 2014, Aslan was acquired by Alitrip (Fliggy), Alibaba’s online travel platform.
Vice President, Market Management, APAC
Expedia Group
Michael Dykes
Michael is leading the team who manage Expedia Group’s lodging inventory across Asia Pacific. In this role, he works with lodging supply partners to maximize their success and potential on the Expedia Group platform and stay ahead of digital innovation. He also works with peers across Expedia Group to create great traveller experiences and be an advocate for the APAC region.
Michael joined Expedia Group in 2015 as Representative Director. In his seven-year tenure with the company, he has built a unique B2B knowledge that can benefit all supply partners as they charter the complexities of the travel ecosystem. Prior to joining Expedia Group, Michael worked at Microsoft where his last role was Director of Corporate Accounts.
Michael holds a degree in Applied Mathematics from M.I.T. He was born in Okinawa (Japan) and raised in the U.S. from the age of 7.
Vice President, Research & Partnerships
BCD Travel
Miriam Moscovici
Miriam works on the forefront of product and service improvements that deliver value for companies of all sizes by driving effective corporate travel programs. In her role as Vice President, Partnerships & Research, Miriam leads research and introduces concepts aimed at engendering a culture of innovation throughout the organization. She draws deep foundational insight into the buyer’s perspective from her eight years spent as a corporate travel manager. With this knowledge she oversees the BCD Marketplace and Developer Hub, managing a vetted selection of contemporary corporate travel solutions as well as valuable travel data and insights.
Her industry experience and technology savvy, combined with a provocative communication style, keeps her in high demand as a speaker, panelist and judge, including at ACTE, GBTA, and the Phocuswright Innovation Summit. Miriam uses a curriculum she developed to teach students at Metro State University in Denver, where she is enthusiastically grooming the next generation of talent. She was named a 2018 Corporate Travel Innovator by Skift, a global travel industry publication.
Editor In Chief
PhocusWire
Mitra Sorrells
Mitra Sorrells joined PhocusWire as a senior reporter in January 2018 and became editor in chief in May 2022.
Sorrells has more than two decades of experience as a journalist. Prior to joining PhocusWire she was technology editor and Orlando bureau chief at BizBash, a trade media outlet for the event industry.
Co-founder
Tin Men Capital
Murli Ravi
Murli is Co-Founder of Tin Men Capital, a Venture Capital firm that invests primarily in B2B technology startups operating out of the Southeast Asia market. Beyond funding, Tin Men Capital are strong supporters of the B2B community by providing insights on the opportunities and risks unique to the space and mentorship to the founders operating in it.
Prior to venture capital, Murli was at Temasek Holdings in the mid-2000s, where he covered the global natural resources sector including mining, agriculture, alternative energy, commodities trading and more. He also worked on other sectors such as beverages, infrastructure, technology and manufacturing. He is a seasoned venture capitalist and was Head of South and Southeast Asian investments at JAFCO Investments, Japan’s largest independent venture capital firm. Starting from a relatively young age in 2008, Murli has been a board member of over 25 companies, which spanned Singapore, India, United States, and Australia, the largest of which had a headcount of over 2,000 employees. These firms have primarily focused on enterprise customers across a wide range of industries, including media, advertising, telecommunications, fashion, banking and financial services, real estate, consumer electronics and semiconductors, among many others. He has also been on the entrepreneur’s side of the table, giving him a deep appreciation of the issues entrepreneurs face.
Early in his career, Murli conducted academic research into innovation and entrepreneurship at INSEAD. He holds the Honorary role of Entrepreneur-in-Residence at INSEAD today guiding MBA and Executive MBA students, and has previously taught entrepreneurship to undergraduates at NUS Business School. Murli is also the host of WDKY (What Doesn’t Kill You) podcast, interviewing entrepreneurs who have found success in Southeast Asia in order to inspire and disseminate best practices to other aspiring entrepreneurs. His passion for sharing knowledge has won him many accolades from the many entrepreneurs and students he has come across.
Murli’s passions extend beyond the directly applicable fields of business and technology entrepreneurship. He reads widely, spanning everything from mathematics, physics and computing to literature, economics and history. He is also a keen cyclist and won a gold medal representing Singapore at the 2018 Asian Cycling Championships.
Murli can speak credibly and with authority on matters regarding entrepreneurship such as the impact of regulations on businesses, flows of capital and the parallels between entrepreneurship across Silicon Valley, China, India and Southeast Asia. He can also discuss
the spectrum of applicability of future technology to larger businesses, both as potential beneficiaries as well as from a standpoint of disruption and provide his views on the startup ecosystem and the investment landscape as a whole.
Murli has been invited to speak for various media platforms and panels like the VCCircle, the British Chamber of Commerce and Private Equity SE Asia. He also contributes to the development of policy through his involvement in a government working group with Intellectual Property Office of Singapore (IPOS) and Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA).
CEO
Tour Amigo
Murray Decker
Murray Decker is the founder of a B2B travel tech SaaS called Tour Amigo. Murray has over 15 years experience in technology, travel and marketing and began his journey as a tour leader and operations manager for prominent tour operators throughout Europe, Asia and Australia. His diverse career has been in procurement, product management, technology solutions as well as corporate travel and retail, for Australia’s largest travel agency. Murray is a serial entrepreneur having founded a luxury European tour operator business and a tech consulting company. His passions, alongside tennis and golf, is to revolutionise the tourism and events industries with innovative technology and software.
Co-founder/Vice President, Business Development
Flightroutes24
Nancy Zhou
Ms. Nancy Zhou is the co-founder and VP (Business Development) of Flightroutes24, a leading global travel contents aggregator.
Flightroutes24.com was founded in Hong Kong in 2014 and has a research and development centre in Shenzhen, China. Based on its self-developed JET-X trading system, the company directly and simply presents advantageous airline ticket products from over 60 countries around the world to its customers, in order to meet the industry’s high standards for product coverage, service professionalism, system stability, and risk sensitivity. Flightroutes covers airline ticket products from all types of airlines around the world (over 700 airlines and 500,000 routes). In 2022, compared to 2019, Flightroutes’ transaction volume has increased by over 200%.In 2023, while continuing to provide advantageous airline ticket products, Flightroutes24 will transform its understanding of the industry into technology services, data services, and SaaS solutions through its technological capabilities. Flightroutes’ SaaS solutions have already been chosen by dozens of partners in different countries, providing them with a constant source of technological development to empower their businesses and make things more efficient. In addition, Flightroutes24 will launch a hotel booking channel in 2023 to meet customers’ one-stop “flight + hotel” procurement needs.
Ms. Zhou has over 10 years of experiences and market exposure in air transport and OTA industry. Before joining Flightroutes24, she was in charge of international expansion at Qunar owned by trip.com Group, where she oversaw business collaborations between Qunar and the world’s top airlines as well as the OTAs.
Ms. Zhou also worked for Shenzhen Airlines where she managed the on-boarding process of Shenzhen Airlines joining the Star Alliance, furthermore, she also acted as the CEO’s special advisor on international collaboration issues.
Ms. Zhou holds a Bachelor’s degree in Air Transport Management from Loughborough University in the UK, and a Master’s degree in Transport Planning from Leeds University in the UK.
Managing Partner
Velocity Ventures
Nicholas Cocks
Mr. Nicholas Cocks is a Co-Founder and serves as Managing Partner at Velocity Ventures (Singapore). He also serves as Chief Executive Officer at ReadyVentures. He also served as Board Member at Lumitics and Forest Advisorenture. He started his career in 1985 as an accountant with Arthur Andersen Co in Sydney, Australia. He left the profession in 1989 to join his father’s readymix concrete business in Adelaide, Australia. Six months later they sold the company to Adelaide Brighton Cement and he turned his attention to South East Asia.
Regional Director, South Asia, Oceania & Chains
Booking.com
Nuno Guerreiro
Nuno Guerreiro joined Booking.com in 2007 and was appointed Regional Director for South Asia, Oceania & Chains in October 2020. Based in Singapore, Nuno leads on operations, business development and strategy for South Asia and Oceania – vibrant and emerging markets across the region.
Nuno has served in variety of regional leadership roles across his native Portugal, France, Brazil and Canada. Most recently, he was Regional Manager for Global Chains based in Singapore. Prior to this role, he was the Regional Manager for Canada based out of Toronto.
Nuno graduated from the University of Algarve with a Licentiate Degree in Hospitality Management. With his passion for soccer, he was also an official referee for 10 years with the Frederacao Portuguesa de Futebol in Portugal.
Co-Founder & Partner
Asia Partners
Oliver Rippel
Oliver M. Rippel is a Partner and Co-Founder of Asia Partners.
Previously he was the CEO of B2C e-commerce for Naspers, which included all e-tail, B2C Marketplaces, and online travel operations globally. As of Dec 2017, the B2C portfolio of Naspers was yielding a total portfolio IRR of 30%, higher than Naspers’ total internet portfolio (outside of Tencent) IRR of 23% at the time, generating exits >US$4Bn.
Mr. Rippel led all of Naspers’ investments in Flipkart, where he served as Naspers’ appointed Director to the Board for six years, which included chairing the Audit Committee and being part of the Investment Committee. In August 2018, Flipkart’s exit to Walmart was one of the very largest exits ever in the Internet and e-commerce space and India’s largest-ever exit of a technology company. Walmart invested US$16 billion to obtain an approximate 77% shareholding at closing. As part of this transaction, Naspers exited fully, selling its 11.2% percent stake for US$2.2Bn. The investment was a US$1.6Bn or 3.6x return over six years, at an estimated 29% IRR.
Mr. Rippel joined Naspers in January 2009 as head of business development in Southeast Asia before managing e-commerce in Africa and the Middle East shortly after. From 2011 to 2014 he oversaw e-commerce in Southeast Asia, India, and Africa, after which he was managing online services segments including e-tail outside of Europe, travel, real estate, and mobile services.
Before working for Naspers, Mr. Rippel spent nine years at eBay – first in his home country Germany and then as part of the Asia-Pacific region in China, Korea, and Southeast Asia. There, he mostly focused on strategy, business development, as well as category management, and marketing operations. Mr. Rippel is of dual Asian and European ancestry. He studied economics in Berlin, Germany, and holds the INSEAD International Directors Program Certificate. He is also a member of the Young Presidents Organization Singapore Chapter.
CEO
Agoda
Omri Morgenshtern
Omri Morgenshtern is the Chief Executive Officer of Agoda, part of Booking Holdings (Nasdaq: BKNG). He was appointed in July 2022. In his former role as COO, Omri was instrumental in driving global operations, Product, Partner Services, and the Customer Experience Group.
Omri joined Agoda in 2014 as Senior Product Owner, Algorithms and Learning Systems, and was later promoted first to Vice President of Product Development, then to Chief Product Officer and Chief Operating Officer in 2018.
He was co-founder & CEO of Qlika, an award-winning UpWest Labs start-up specializing in online marketing optimization, which was acquired by Booking Holdings Inc. in 2014.
Omri received an M.S. Magna Cum Laude in Physics from Tel Aviv University and B.S. Cum Laude in Physics, Computer Science and Mathematics from The Hebrew University.
General Partner, SOSV/
Managing Director, Orbit Startups
Oscar Ramos
Oscar is a General Partner at SOSV and Managing Director at Orbit Startups. A full-stack innovator with expertise ranging from product development to corporate strategy, he leads the Orbit Startups program in Shanghai from recruitment to program delivery and oversees development of the Orbit Startups ecosystem of mentors, founders, investors, and partners.
Oscar has experience as an entrepreneur, management consultant, and early stage investor. A Telecom MEng and Biomedical PhD dropout, Oscar began his career 14 years ago as an R&D engineer working in Reseach Center for Ericsson and Telefonica until discovering Business Model Innovation and transitioning to the world of startups. After several years working for a MedTech Startup, Oscar moved to China in early 2008. Since his arrival in China, he has been involved in innovation—product launches, go-to market strategies, venture capital financing, and M&As for startups and multinationals.
Oscar is a regular speaker about innovation and entrepreneurship at conferences worldwide and is a learning facilitator in MBA programs about entrepreneurial management, innovation, and venture capital.
Representative Director & CEO
Rakuten STAY, Inc.
Ota Munekatsu
Ota Munekatsu is the executive officer of Rakuten Group, Inc., the Representative Director & CEO of Rakuten STAY, Inc. and CEO & Director of Rakuten Travel Xchange Pte. Ltd. He joined Rakuten Group in 2005 and worked as an executive officer of Rakuten Travel, general manager of Rakuten Travel international business and product manager for Chinese subsidiaries. His deep knowledge of travel market and multi-faceted operation experiences made him an inspirational decisive business leader of Rakuten STAY and Rakuten Travel Xchange. Ota is currently based in the global financial hub of Singapore, leading both businesses to achieve their next growth of global distribution in travel industry and providing the Japanese luxury style vacation rental to global travelers.
CEO & founder
Glyde Payments
Paulina Klotzbucher
I have spent the last 12 years in various C-suite roles at Travelstart from CTO to CMO to CCO and Managing Director. During Covid while reassessing opportunities on the table for the travel industry I founded GlydePay – a spin off from the Travelstart group focusing on solving the many inherent payment problems in the travel industry and beyond in partnership with Mastercard and Access bank.
Managing Director
Phocuswright
Pete Comeau
Mr. Comeau is responsible for overall strategic and operational leadership at Phocuswright. Pete oversees all aspects of Phocuswright’s commercial activities including product, sales and service, and marketing. He also plays a key role in product development and business development strategy for Phocuswright research, events and media businesses globally. Pete is a frequent speaker at industry events and heads Phocuswright’s coverage of startups and innovation.
Mr. Comeau’s travel industry career spans over two decades. Previously, he managed strategic partnerships at Orbitz in Chicago, where he assisted in growing and managing accounts for the Orbitz Partner Network. Prior to Orbitz, Pete was the sales leader at Moguls Mountain Travel, a ski tour wholesaler in Boulder, CO. He helped design, implement and maintain four reservation systems during his tenure and managed and mentored a team of successful sales agents.
Based in the Denver, Colorado area, Pete holds an M.B.A. from Daniels College of Business and graduated magna cum laude from Bowdoin College with a degree in government and economics.
Founder, CEO & Managing Director
Mystifly
Rajeev Kumar
Rajeev is a eminent visionary with a background rooted in the Technology & Travel Industry. He channelled his entrepreneurial spirit into building a travel technology platform that enables businesses scale newer geographies with ease.
Throughout his 20 years of experience, he has held leadership roles in various capacities across India, UK, Europe and North America. A Computer Science Engineering graduate from Bangalore University, he has consistently demonstrated thought‐leadership and ambitions that propel evolution in the technology and travel landscape. Not one to shy away from collaborative growth, he has supported and shared insights with leading players in the Travel and Hospitality sectors across the globe.
Born from his vision to ease global air travel, Rajeev founded Mystifly in 2009. Since its inception, Mystifly has gone on to win the title of “World’s Leading Airline Consolidator” four times in a row. Under Rajeev’s leadership, the business has scaled across borders with a customer base that is spread across 80+ countries.
CEO & Founder
DidaTravel
Rikin Wu
Rikin Wu has been working as a Chief Executive Officer at DidaTravel for 12 years. As the No.1 B2B travel wholesaler in China, and a leader in APAC travel distribution, Dida is a global travel tech leader committed to providing its customers with the fastest, most flexible access to top travel products worldwide (hotels, flights, car hire, transfers, tickets and tours) via its cutting-edge, open platform technology. With agility at its core, Dida’s global team has built a market leading reputation for technical excellence and customer support that aligns with Dida’s vision to empower 1 million travel partners.
Founder & former CEO, Viator / former CEO, Rome2rio / Non-executive Director, Veltra Corp & Jayride / Board Member, Tourism Tasmania
Rod Cuthbert
Rod is a pioneer of the global online travel industry. He was the founder, CEO & Chairman of Viator, the leading global marketplace for tour and experience products. He was subsequently the CEO & Chairman of Rome2rio, the multi-modal search engine; and is currently a non-executive director of Veltra Corporation, the Tokyo Stock Exchange listed seller of tour and experience products, and Jayride, the Sydney-based global marketplace for airport transfers. He is also a member of the board of directors of Tourism Tasmania.
CEO & Co-founder
Wego
Ross Veitch
Ross is CEO & Co-Founder at Wego, which is online travel marketplace that provides top ranked mobile apps and websites for users living in the APAC and MENA regions. Wego harnesses powerful technology that simplifies the process of searching, comparing and booking flights and hotels across hundreds of airlines, hotels and online travel agency websites. Wego is has dual-HQs in Singpaore and Dubai and is backed by top-tier investors including Tiger Global, Crescent Group, Square Peg Capital and the MBC Group.
Ross is a veteran of the Asian internet industry having established Yahoo!s Southeast Asian operations in Singapore back in 1998 and leading product development efforts across the region for 6+ years. He is also Singapore Co-Chair of H2, the premier global leadership network for the digital industry. Ross has been an active angel investor in the technology sector for a decade and enjoys working with other passionate entrepreneurs. He has worked in Sydney, Melbourne, London, Kuala Lumpur and is now splits his time between Singapore and Dubai. He travels frequently for business but not nearly enough for leisure.
General Manager, Indonesia, Malaysia & Singapore
Klook
Sarah Wan
As Klook’s General Manager for Singapore, Sarah oversees the travel and leisure platform’s operations, including business development, marketing and e-commerce. Over the past year, Sarah has led her team in tackling the domestic tourism market amidst a rapidly changing environment – from kickstarting Klook’s foray into hotels and cruises, to innovating and enhancing traditional tourism products to better suit local tastes.
Sarah was previously Southeast Asia Marketing Director (Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore) for Klook. Prior to that, she worked in Edelman’s Brand practice – where she led consumer campaigns for prominent international and local brands including Diageo, Shell, Singapore Tourism Board, Lagardère Sports, Kimberly Clark and Nestlé.
General Manager/ Regional MD (Asia Pacific)
Vesta
Shabab Muhaddes
Fraud | Payment risk management | FinTech | Digital Wallets | NeoBanks | Digital Bank | Start-up | Payment Enablers | MasterCard | Visa
An accomplished and experienced professional with international experience and solid records in the payment and banking industry with hands-on experience in General Management, P&L Management, Business Development, Digital and Core Product Development, and Fintech Partnership Engagements.
An innovative and critical thinker with focus on developing new business opportunities for payments, banking and fintech industry, and actively developing new products and solutions to transform businesses, leveraging human centric design (HCD) framework.
A global talent with experience in operating businesses in North America and Asia.
Head of Payment, APAC
Uber
SheueChee Beh
A 18 years’ experience Payment Specialist working in multiple disciplines (From presales consultant to project management and business development) with unique and well-rounded exposure mixed between technology solution provider, bank, and E-Commerce payment processor/PSP. Possess a holistic and deep understanding of payment ecosystem from Issuing, Acquiring, E-Commerce, real-time payment to payment switching network experience.
Complement with core strengths in partnership and relationship management across all continents. Networking includes banks, card schemes, payment processors, aggregators, wallets, industry bodies, and merchants.
Strong interpersonal skills, an excellent communicator with internal/external stakeholders, and cross-functional teams refining complex messages in clear, understandable, and convincing terms as well as being able to tailor messages for varying audiences in a relatable manner lead to partners, customers and company success.
Outside of work, I am a proud member of the Rise Up 2019 program which empowers women in leadership in the Financial Services and Fintech industry. We are together to inspire each other to be joyful, healthy, and thrive to be a better version of ourselves.
Chief Strategy Officer & Head of Corporate Development
Fliggy
Simeon Shi
CEO
Travelstart
Stephan Ekbergh
Stephan Ekbergh married father of 4, lives in Cape Town. Ex professional DJ for 10 years. Entrepreneur in Travel. Started the E-commerce revolution in Scandinavia 1999. Is now doing the same in Africa. Passion for releasing gifts and entrepreneurship with people. Writes and speaks about business, life and taking risks. Investor and active boardmember, also works with and finances non profits organization Thembalitscha foundation.
Co-founder & CEO
Live My Legend
Stephanie Daniel
Stephanie grew up in a small village in England, which ignited her early passion for the power of travel to drive individual and collective evolution. She studied MA Economics at Cambridge which amplified her foundational belief in the power of data to help us make good decisions and allocate resources. She spent almost 15 years in investment banking with Deutsche Bank in London and NY building the strongest foundation of markets, finance, strategy, management, client and product innovation. With various roles through her career she was most recently Managing Director and co-head of a structured finance strategic coverage team of over 30 people and $400million revenue. As well as being on the Global Executive Committee Stephanie was on the Steering Committee of the people strategy, as well as recruitment and D&I initiatives.
However the entrepreneurial spirit was always going to propel Stephanie to deliver on her mission to build a platform to empower more people to experience the world and drive authentic connection and growth. Having met her co-founder Shaina Shiwarski and bonding over shared passions and pain points they realized Shaina’s complementary background of 10yrs in tech, go-to-market and product meant they were uniquely positioned to harness the power of tech and data to help drive the industry forward in positive way for travelers and providers.
Legends unlocks a new era of personalization by transforming phone and photo data into actionable insights and preferences. We solve the problem of scattered consumer data, the impending cookie crisis and data ownership concerns, unlocking $130 billion in revenue potential. The future has to be zero-party data – our AI-powered platform, TravelDNA, leverages opt-in consent to create permissioned, enriched, real-time customer profiles delivering segments and signals to help brands improve revenue, loyalty and experience. We are creating the new data layer that puts the human first.With backing from Techstars, Trip Ventures and Angels we have been recognized as a Phocuswright North America Start-Up Winner and Skift IDEAS Innovation Problem Solver Finalist. Our seasoned team boasts 35+ years of experience in finance, tech, and travel, supported by a 200+ years-experienced advisory board
Stephanie continues to explore the world, from a current base in NY with her young daughter, husband and dog. She loves reading classic fiction, yoga and restaurants whilst connecting with friends old and new.
Managing Director, Operations & Partnerships
JetBlue Ventures
Stephen Snyder
“COVID-19 accelerated disruption in the travel and hospitality industries. Beyond needing to overcome short-term challenges like those related to health and safety, it placed a renewed focus on building sustainable travel businesses. I’m excited to help define the future of travel, working to diversify and accelerate revenue generation and integrate game-changing cost-saving solutions.”
As Managing Director of Operations & Partnerships, Stephen’s role is to build an ecosystem of partners and deployment opportunities for the many technologies of JBV’s portfolio companies. He focuses on advancing innovation thinking and compelling value propositions throughout JetBlue and its partners. Stephen joined JBV from JetBlue where he spent time on the airline’s Strategic Planning team. He holds an MBA in entrepreneurial management from the Wharton School and also earned an MA from the University of Pennsylvania and a BA from the University of Michigan.
Jetting Personal
Favorite travel memory: “A few JetBlue colleagues and I developed our own version of ‘The Amazing Race.’ We picked a European destination out of a hat on Friday afternoon – the first team there won a small prize and immense bragging rights.”
JetBlue destination he’d like to visit next: Austin, Texas
Head of Public Policy APAC
Airbnb
Steven Liew
Steven Liew is Airbnb’s Asia Pacific Director of Public Policy and is passionate about working with governments and other stakeholders to empower people and communities to share in the benefits of travel. He has close to three decades of experience working in both the technology and intellectual property law spaces, including the companies such as eBay, Louis Vuitton, Baker & McKenzie, Nokia, and APCO Worldwide. In 2016, Steven co-founded a startup investment and advisory firm, Cosmic Cafe in Fukuoka, Japan. Steven is a graduate of National University of Singapore Law Faculty. In his spare time, he is an avid yogi and enjoys reading.
Senior Vice President – Travel Distribution Engineering & Centre Head
Amadeus
Subramanian (Mani) Ganeshan
Mani Ganeshan is the Senior Vice President – Travel Distribution Engineering and Centre Head for Amadeus Technology Centers in India.
As the head of Engineering for the Travel Distribution unit, Mani’s responsibilities include the Front Office, Leisure and Back Office Solutions for Travel Sellers. He is responsible for implementing Amadeus’ LCC and NDC Strategy working closely with colleagues in the Airlines Unit. Mani drives the technology vision of Amadeus to conceptualize the travel distribution marketplace of the future.
Amadeus Labs Bangalore is the second largest R&D site for Amadeus after Sophia Antipolis, France. More than 3000 engineers innovate on core products of Amadeus that provide the backbone for the travel industry players to manage their Distribution and IT Operations efficiently. As the Centre Head of Amadeus Labs Bengaluru, Mani’s main responsibility is to implement the Amadeus Global R&D footprint strategy in the region; to better synergize between the business units, R&D and regional commercial teams. Amadeus also recently opened its 2nd center in India in Pune.
Under his visionary leadership, Amadeus Labs has seen meteoric growth in a short span and received various Industry accolades for the same. Amadeus Labs has been ranked 5 in Times Ascent Dream Companies to work for in 2018, Great place to work certified 3 years in a row and been identified among the best places to work in India, in the IT ITES BPM Industry 2 years in a row.
Before joining Amadeus, Mani worked for several multinational organizations like Ness Technologies and Accenture in Bangalore, Wells Fargo Bank and MCI Telecommunications in USA and ATOS Origin in Mumbai. Mani holds a Master of Computer Applications degree from the University of Pune, India and an MBA in Executive Management from Colorado Technical University, USA
Senior Director Online Business
Sabre Travel Network Asia Pacific
Tai Parata
Tai Parata is the Head of South East Asia and Online Business lead in APAC for Sabre Travel Network Asia Pacific.
With over 20 years of experience in growing businesses across 4 continents, Tai is an avid business developer and e-business driver. He has marked expertise in the online and airline travel sector, starting in the online sector in Europe with lastminute.com in 2000. Later serving as Director of marketing for ZUJI.com in APAC, and as an Ancillary Revenue Manager for Air New Zealand.
Prior to joining Sabre in 2012, Tai held the position of Managing Director at Ensogo.com, an online Coupon business model where he ran the travel business across Thailand, Philippines and Indonesia.
Tai is a New Zealander of Maori and Scottish heritage living in Singapore, married to a Japanese wife with a son and daughter born in Singapore.
Chief Commercial Officer
Almosafer
Tarique Khatri
With over 20 years of experience in the travel industry, Tarique is a seasoned executive who brings a wealth of knowledge and expertise to his role as the Chief Commercial Officer at Almosafer.
As the head of the company’s sourcing and fulfillment operations, he harnesses the buying power of Almosafer, to negotiate and deepen relationships with its extensive supplier network, as well as manage the fulfillment of products and services.
In addition to his expertise in sourcing and fulfillment, Tarique also holds responsibility for driving product development and revenue growth for the company. He is passionate about creating innovative products that meet the evolving needs of Almosafer’s customers, and is committed to maximizing revenue by leveraging his deep understanding of customer behavior, market trends, and new technologies.
Tarique Khatri is a visionary leader who oversees Almosafer’s distribution operations, skillfully guiding the company’s services to existing key vendors while positioning Almosafer Activities as the preferred distribution channel for merchants in KSA. With his expertise and innovative strategies, Tarique spearheads the distribution operation to new heights, enabling Almosafer to reach a wider audience and strengthen its foothold in the industry.
As a veteran member of the Almosafer team, Tarique Khatri has been a part of the company for over 8 years. His experience and dedication have given him a deep understanding of the Almosafer business, having been a founder of the first online business of the company. This has allowed him to effectively lead the company’s Centre of Excellence (CoE) the sole sourcing and fulfillment arm of Almosafer for all their travel business verticals that includes Online, Leisure, Corporate, Government, Hajj & Umrah and Destination Management, Tarique is well-equipped to drive commercial success for Almosafer. He has held key roles at multinational travel corporations such as Cleartrip and Kuoni, where he led the platform’s expansion into the Middle East and the establishment of various supplier and distributor functions.
Head of Travel & Tourism, SEA
TikTok
Tejveer Singh Bedi
Tejveer Singh Bedi heads the travel partnerships for Tiktok SEA. His team helps travel companies including Online Travel Agents, Hotels connect with and market to travel communities on Tiktok. He has extensive commercial experience in travel previously heading sales, revenue management and operations in hotel chains. Tejveer served as president HSMAI Singapore is currently a board member of HSMAI commercial advisory board. He is passionate about technology in travel and assists various travel tech startups in their growth journey as an advisor.
Principal
T2Impact
Timothy O’Neil-Dunne
Timothy O’Neil-Dunne is a principal at 777 Partners, a private equity investment firm based in Miami with deep experience in aviation. He is a frequent speaker and commentator on aviation, travel distribution, technology, startups and innovation at events around the globe. Timothy is also the head of product at Air Black Box, a global travel technology company founded to help airlines address the complexities of cross-selling travel product inventory. Air Black Box is headquartered in Manchester, UK with offices in the USA and Asia. Most recently, Air Black Box was recognized as a 2019 CIO 100 Award Winner.
Before founding Air Black Box, Timothy was a founding management team member with Expedia, heading its international and ground transportation portfolios. He also spent time with Worldspan as their international head of technology, where he managed technology services from infrastructure to product.
Board Member, Manila Angel Investors Network/
Co-Founder, Avaya Ventures
Tina Di Cicco
Tina Di Cicco is a co-founder of two travel tech companies; has led the founding team of two Asian airlines; and managed commercial and marketing at Lufthansa and IHG.
A seasoned marketing and strategy professional, she drives market growth, geographical expansion and strategy for sustainability at start-ups and blue-chip companies in Southeast Asia, Hong Kong and Macau. Tina has led, financed, grown and exited multiple start-ups.
Currently, she leads Avaya, a consulting and investment company in travel and technology. Tina is passionate about aviation and tourism having led business at Viva Macau, the low cost carrier that challenged Macau’s national airline 25-year aviation monopoly; and at Air Juan, the first commercial seaplane operation in the Philippines. She also helped I-Quest Corporation, the first provider of Internet in hotel rooms in Asia and Europe, approved to list in the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in 2000.
Tina has been in school boards and mentorship programs, including New York University (NYU) Singapore and German Accelerator for Southeast Asia. She also is a board member of ASKI Global, a non-profit devoted to financial literacy and entrepreneurship for overseas foreign workers. She speaks frequently on women leadership, sustainable tourism, mentorship and economic empowerment.
Chief Product & Technology Officer
Travelport
Tom Kershaw
Tom was appointed to the role of Chief Product & Technology Officer in June 2021. In his role at Travelport, Tom is charged with overseeing the development and delivery of products and solutions for the entire company.
He has more than two decades of experience leading innovation, technical strategy and execution within global technology and Internet organizations, and has worked on mobile application development, advertising, data science and large-scale data processing. Prior to Travelport, he served as Chief Technology Officer at Magnite, Inc. and has held product and technology leadership roles at Google, Ericsson and VeriSign Inc.
Tom is a bold change-maker and during his career, he personally spearheaded meaningful change within the independent advertising industry and made a significant impact on commercial models within the Cloud infrastructure space during his time at Google. Additionally, Tom is the co-founder of Prebid.org, a leading open-source software organization, and he continues to advocate for transparency, fairness and privacy on the open Web.
Tom is a graduate of New York University, where he earned a Diploma in Science, and of the London School of Economics, where he earned a Master of Arts degree in global and Latin American economics. Outside of the office, you’ll find him enjoying live music, snowboarding and taking long hikes.
Co-founder
ZUZU Hospitality
Vikram Malhi
Vikram Malhi is the Co-founder of ZUZU Hospitality Solutions, a Singapore based start-up that manages sales and online distribution for independent budget hotels across Asia. Before starting his entrepreneurial journey, Vikram was Managing Director for Expedia Asia and was instrumental in growing Expedia brand across 11 countries in Asia.
He spent a total of 8 years at Expedia, taking on multiple senior level roles including marketing, customer loyalty, operations and general management. In addition to his deep expertise in the online travel and hospitality sectors, he has strong experience in technology and business consulting. He worked at IBM Consulting early in his career and received MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
CEO & Founder
TripZilla.com
Winnie Tan
Winnie is the CEO and founder of TripZilla.com, Southeast Asia’s largest independent travel media company which reaches over 20 million travel consumers every month. TripZilla creates authentic content which inspires the world to travel and connects this audience to suppliers that can help them realize their travel goals.
A “doer” by nature, Winnie is passionate about pulling limited resources together to create something of much greater value. She enjoys making things happen and moving her business forward continuously. Having founded and sold off two businesses, she understands the importance of building a sustainable business – one with real users, paying customers and a clear revenue model. Her vision for TripZilla is to establish the company as a leading travel brand in Southeast Asia.
Founder
WiT
Yeoh Siew Hoon
Siew Hoon has been covering the travel industry beat in Asia Pacific for decades, starting off as a rookie reporter and going on to lead and launch the region’s key industry media titles. In 2005, she founded WiT (Web in Travel) to tackle how technology was changing travel in Asia Pacific and created a new space in the fast-growing, dynamic region with a dedicated media and events platform.
Over the years, she took WiT to new places, launching editions in Tokyo, Seoul, Middle East and Europe to keep the world’s attention focused on the three pillars of travel, technology and Asia.
Following the acquisition by Northstar Travel Group in 2014, she led the launch of Travel Weekly Asia and M&C Asia and formed the editorial team to execute the entry of Northstar to Asia.
Her work has been recognised by numerous institutions including the Singapore Tourism Board which recognised her as Tourism Entrepreneur of the Year in 2014. The WiT Singapore conference, which remains its tentpole event, has won several awards including Most Innovative Marketing Initiative and Trade Conference Of The Year.
In 2020, WiT Singapore became the first travel conference to go fully hybrid, paving the way for a new model in events.
Other than writing about travel, Siew Hoon is also a published author of titles such as “Around Asia In One Hour: Tales of Condoms, Chillies & Curries”, children’s books such as “Adventures of Habibie The Turtle” and “The Story of Baitong and Boon” and host of “A Life In Travel” podcast.
Co-founder, Questeon/
Partner & Head of Partnerships, Tribe
Yock Song Law
Yock Song is a tourism, hospitality and technology professional with over 12 years of experience, specialising in Government Relations, Go-to-Market Strategy, Business and Product Development for International Markets.
He is the Co-founder of Questeon, a creators’ enabled, on-demand platform for city discovery, where users can interact with their surroundings, uncover stories, complete tasks and discover new places. Think of the platform as a combination of Pokemon Go + outdoor escape room.
As a Partner and Head of Partnerships & Business Development at Tribe – a travel boutique start-up specialising in creating in-depth, experiental tours of Singapore – Yock Song is instrumental in the strategic direction, innovation and product development of the company. In a short span of time, he led the team to create various popular tour products, combining guide and influencer on every tour; HawkerWalk series – a tour designed to bring out the stories, passion and grit of our local hawker heroes; Niu Che Shui Game Tour, a world’s first tour concept that combines puzzles solving and storytelling of the precinct where the tour happened. Tribe was also the first few operators to launch a behind the scenes live stream tours offerings, creating new revenue stream for the business. To date, it has brought live stream tours to thousands of viewers globally. Under Yock Song’s strategic leadership, Trie is the winner for Outstanding Tour Experience Award 2021, the most prestigious award by the Singapore Tourism Board.
Prior to Tribe, Yock Song works in the Singapore Tourism Board (STB), holding different positions and portfolios across his 10 years in the organisation. As Senior Manager in STB Guangzhou, he was responsible for tech & media partnerships & Business Development, looking after the markets of Shenzhen, Xiamen, Fuzhou and Quanzhou. He also forged close partnership with technology giant Tencent Group, which led to the signing of Tencent’s first international MOU with a National Tourism Organisation. Such efforts resulted in improved accuracy in marketing to Chinese target audience and orchestrated Tencent’s QQ first international live shoot event at ZoukOut Singapore 2017.
Yock Song graduated with a Masters in Public Administration and Management (Mandarin) from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy and a Bachelor of Business Management with a double major in Finance and Marketing from the Singapore Management University.
