From outbound travel to rising mobile numbers and rapidly increasing digital travel sales – and digital spend - this diverse region cannot be ignored

Spanning around 50 countries with diverse languages and cultures, Asia Pacific cannot be viewed in a ‘one-size-fits-all’ fashion. Whereas hotel occupancy rates in 2015 may have risen in China, for example, in APAC overall they are down. Also while the wider region may be home to over a third of the world unique mobile subscribers, in some of the most populous countries, penetration rates remain fairly low. And though Internet penetration in cities may be high, it’s a different story in rural areas. 

But even with a slowing Chinese economy, there are plenty of opportunities, not least in India, which in 2015 witnessed the fastest e-commerce growth rates in the world. In less than two-weeks EyeforTravel will be in Hong Kong for The Smart Traveller: Digital Strategies Asia, but if it’s too late for that join us in Singapore for the Asia Pacific Summit (June 15-16)

Now to the numbers…

In ecommerce, internet usage and mobile subscriptions

1bn      Smart phone users in APAC

1.8bn   Unique mobile subscribers in 2015 (that’s half the world’s unique subscriber connections)

50%     Half the APAC population will have mobile internet access by 2020 (compared to a third in 2014)

8.2%    Growth in APAC internet access rates

649m   The number of internet users in China vs 557m mobile internet users

375m   The number of Indian internet users as of October 2015

36%     Average unique subscriber penetration rate in India, Bangladesh and Pakistan

58%     Expected compound annual growth rate of mobile data traffic to 2019

28.3%  The number of the world’s smartphone users who are Chinese

88%     The number of South Koreans with internet access in the first quarter of 2015  - vs Singapore 81%, Thailand 54%, India 19%, North Korea 1%

18%     The number of Chinese owning a smart watch (45% own a smart TV) 

In ‘inbound’ and ‘outbound travel 

170m   Outbound trips taken in APAC in 2015 (excluding Chinese travel to Hong Kong and Macau

5%       The rise in outbound travellers between January and August 2015 vs 4.5% globally (6.1% growth expected in 2016)

4.3%    The rise in inbound tourists in the first eight months

170m    Outbound trips taken in APAC in 2015

27%     The number of people who want to travel more than they did in 2015 (70% want to travel as much)

84m     Number of Chinese outbound travellers in 2014 

18m     Indian outbound travellers in 2014

2%       The percentage of Indians that travel abroad

In digital travel sales

$243bn    Digital travel sales expected in APAC by 2019 ($136bn in 2015)

$131bn    Expected Chinese digital travel sales by 2019 ($66 billion in 2015)

$34bn      Digital travel sales in Japan by 2019 ($27bn) 

In market share

36%        Ctrip’s share of China’s overall travel market (Qunar 22.5%, Alitrip 12.4%)

11%        Uber’s share of China’s of the ride-booking market

1.8%        The decrease in hotel occupancy (to 70.4%) and revenue per average room ($78.13) in APAC compared to November 2014 (in China, however, occupancy was up 3.4%)

16.3%     Growth in total ad spend in India (digital growing at almost 50%)

80.3%     Growth in Indian e-Commerce  - the strongest in the world

79%       Online searches controlled by Baidu in China 

Sources: EyeforTravel, e-marketer, World Travel Market, Analysis International, STR Global, Statista, GWI China Market Report Q1 2015, Magna Global, Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI)

*  mobile figures are for the 20 countries in APAC with the largest numbers of subscribers

*  Unless otherwise stated the numbers are for Asia Pacific