| |August 20189CIOReviewTechnology now can make the impossible possible. The various forms of tech like AI, AR and VR will forever change the way people sell and buy tickets, book holidays, and interact with service providers iffs and funds infusion in the nation-al railways sector to improve quality and frequency of connectivity, India has started to make the right noises. Will all these promises see success? We need to wait and watch.The second face of the tourism coin is the private sector, where most of the innovation has occurred and will continue to occur for a long time. Domestic and international funding organizations are slowly infusing money into the travel and tourism sector in India. Some state governments are playing hosts to global investors and entrepreneurs to jump-start innovation in the trav-el sector in their respective states.Stats to satiateOnline hotel booking has seen a sub-stantial y-o-y growth of 60% India generated $20 Bn or 9.6% of the GDP in 2016 Creation of 40.343 Mn jobs or 9.3% of its total employment This stat is not just mind-bog-gling but goes to highlight the tremendous potential to create in-novative services and products to serve a large population (domestic and international) hungry for rou-tine and unique travel experiences year round.Present day scenarioToday the challenge is not only to bring more consumers to buy and sell travel services and products on-line, it is also a dire need to stay a few steps ahead in utilizing world-beating, smart technologies such as Chatbots, Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality (AR), and Vir-tual Reality (VR) to enhance the way people consume and experience travel services.What can we do?The entire industry succeeds when it can deliver top quality services at af-fordable cost to the masses. It is my hope to see many innovative com-panies creating lean administrative products and services to help travel service providers such as hoteliers, vacation home owners, and enti-ties who deliver travel experiences and activities achieve efficiency at a competitive cost.This is where we can drive ef-ficiency and discipline and enable businesses to analyze performance and sell smarter. If businesses could pass on the cost benefits of creating and selling amazing services at low cost, then we would succeed as a whole in improving the industry in a small way.The futureThe rapidly evolving tech world is a part of everything today. Technol-ogy now can make the impossible possible. The various forms of tech like AI, AR and VR will forever change the way people sell and buy tickets, book holidays, and interact with service providers such as low cost-high tech mobile phones, 4G and 5G internet speeds. The day is not far when machine will lend a helping hand for tiresome human endeavors making it simple. We be-lieve, now is the time to innovate and succeed. Anil Kumar Prasanna
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