China Travel News

Even short-term headwinds in China's hotel recovery from the pandemic isn't deterring global hotel companies from flooding the market with new developments.

With Chinese travelers staying within the country, destinations and tour groups are wooing Indian vacationers. In other top travel stories this week, Klook raised $200 million in funding, Alaska Airlines made commitments to the 737 MAX, and tourism groups can't agree on testing and vaccination policies.

The setback to China's hotel recovery is a cautionary hotel. In other top travel stories this week, Skift covered mask mandates, vegan tourism, and American Express Global Business Travel's latest acquisition.

All eyes have been on China in terms of its travel recovery. While China's hotel recovery faces a major setback now with a surge of new Covid-19 cases, the country is still likely to make a faster rebound than other parts of the world.

China's move to ban the Tripadvisor-branded app is somewhat of a head scratcher since the app is actually controlled by China's Trip.com Group. Will other U.S.-branded apps, such as Airbnb's be impacted?

Apple has reportedly offered employees a $500 daily cash bonus to fly to China. Despite a few ethical and liability questions, it's not as controversial as it sounds.

Regulators in China, Europe, and the U.S. can certainly screw up on execution of their goals with over-regulation, under-regulation, or initiatives that are off-target. But there's something happening around the globe that points to a new and potentially hopeful era for competition and innovation.

China is like no other place on Earth and Trip.com is like no other online travel agency. It offers lessons on how to build an industry-leading business and how to respond to our deepest crisis ever.

Booking.com, Airbnb, Marriott, and every high-end retail shop on the Champs-Élysées want to see the proliferation of Alipay and other digital payment services to capture the spending of Chinese travelers. But Alipay's key cross-border payments strategy, despite a record-setting IPO, has run into major snags.