Grab's Tie-Up With Indonesia Tourism Gives a Glimpse of Ambitions Beyond Ridehailing
Photo Credit: Indonesia's tourism minister Arief Yahya (left) with Grab's managing director Indonesia Ridzki Kramadibrata launching the partnership in Singapore. Source: Grab Grab
Skift Take
Grab’s partnership with Indonesia’s tourism ministry, the first of its kind between a national tourism body and a ridehailing platform, reveals one of the initial ways it is trying to become Southeast Asia’s super app for a plethora of travel services.
National tourism bodies in Asia have been working with online travel agencies, tours and activity platforms, and online bedbanks to drive bookings through campaigns or promotions, that’s nothing new.
But a one-year collaboration between ridehailing service Grab and Indonesia’s tourism ministry is unprecedented. It shows how ridehailing platforms may be the new WeChat in the super app race in Asia, and that the region’s national tourism bodies are waking up to opportunities to work with them.
Grab, which is on track to raise over $3 billion in funding by the end of the year, has a mission statement of “bringing Southeast Asians closer to what matters to them.” That includes travel, aside from delivering transport, food, parcels and groceries, which it does currently. The region has more than 640 million people, larger than the European Union or North America, and a bulging middle class which loves to travel. Over half of the population is millennials and, with over 700 million mobile connections, it’s a mobile-first world.
The Indonesia tie-up, officially launched in Singapore on November 15, sees Grab foraying into destination marketing, tourism infrastructure building, and eventually travel bookings. That is a scale deeper than a three-month digital marketing contract t
