China's growing business travel market draws global attention
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E-mail Xinhua, December 19, 2020
China's business travel market is expanding rapidly, creatingopportunities for travel companies worldwide.
AirPlus International, a Germantravel payment company, said its accumulated turnover in Chinareached over 1 billion euros (1.2 billion U.S. dollars) this month,making China its third largest overseas market.
"China's business travel market,which is the largest in the world, is leading the change in theglobal travel management industry," said Lucy Wang, managingdirector of AirPlus International China.
The company allows businesses topay for employee travel expenses using a centralized corporateaccount, reducing paperwork and creating cost efficiencies.
China overtook the United States asthe top business travel market in the world in 2015, according theGlobal Business Travel Association (GBTA),
In 2017, Chinese business travelspending is expected to hit 344.6 billion U.S. dollars, up 8.4percent year on year, 51.5 billion dollars more than the estimatedU.S. business travel spending, according to the GBTA.
Wang said the fast growth waslikely to continue as initiatives such as the Belt and RoadInitiative were boosting international demand.
As Chinese companies expand theirglobal footprint, they are also bringing in new technologies suchas mobile payment to boost efficiency.
China leads the world in mobilepayments for business travel, according to a 2017 AirPlusstudy.
"These trends create challenges andopportunities for travel management firms, which are striving tocreate a 'fusion management' model that allows all paperwork andpayment to be done in a single mobile app," Wang said.
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