News & Stories

Doha. In the middle of Doha, a completely new city district is planned to be built using traditional architecture together with modern technology. The “Musheireb” project should transform the architectural centre of Doha with narrow alleyways, pedestrian zones, and an atmosphere that reflects the traditional Qatari culture. Apart from 950 new living quarters, the plans include the erection of theatres, galleries, restaurants and shops; four hotels and two new congress centres are also planned. The redevelopment company appointed for the project is Dohaland, a subsidiary of the Qatar Foundation. The total costs for the transformation are approximately five billion US dollars.

New Delhi. India is a colourful and chaotic country and the touristic trade fairs and exhibitions are just the same. With the "South Asian Travel Trade Exhibition", an outbound trade fair seems to be establishing itself and showing potential for the future. This is probably one reason why ITB Berlin joined as a strategical partner three years ago.

Nuremberg. GfK Travel Insights, the tourism distribution panel of the Gesellschaft fuer Konsumforschung in Nuremberg recently started analysing hotel reservations. It analyses and evaluates up to 700,000 reservations involving hotel stays in detail per month. This creates transparency with respect to market development, demand, market shares and market potential. GfK will present further details next week at ITB Berlin 2011.

Cairo/Vienna. Egypt’s revolution has swept empty the hotels, beaches and World Heritage sites. Today in Cairo, people are protesting to bring back tourism.

Frankfurt/M. There are five key trends in the holiday house sector: city trips are on the rise, more and more couples favour holiday houses, travel duration is getting shorter, there is an increasing interest in European and long-range destinations, and more and more vacationers are also taking safety into consideration when choosing their travel destination.

Cairo/Vienna. The land of the pharaohs is in crisis: Holidaymakers flee and hotels close. If the situation doesn't improve, Egypt threatens to disappear from the tourist map altogether, at least for the time being. Hotels in Cairo bear the brunt of the damage, though news of hotel looting has later proved to be incorrect. Now the damage has spread to the resorts in familiar coastal areas: tour operators have removed Egypt from their programmes for the coming weeks. The result: hotels are closing entire storeys and an increasing number of employees are being dismissed. Only billionaires such as Samih Sawiris have the financial clout to survive through longer drought periods. A report on the current situation faced by Egyptian hoteliers.

Berlin. The outlook is exceptionally good for ITB Berlin as final preparations are under way for an event which between 9 and 13 March will be taking place for the 45th time. Overall, Messe Berlin expects around 11,000 exhibiting companies and organizations from more than 180 countries to be present in the 26 halls on the Berlin Exhibition Grounds. The focus is on Poland, the partner country of ITB Berlin.

Frankfurt. Female executives have much more power and potential than they realise. This is clarified with the newest survey whose results will also flow into the "Women's Leadership Forum" at the IMEX in May.

Davos. Annual buzz in Davos: this week, from January 26 to 30, politicians, managers and royal guests – all in all 2,500 top-class participants – gather at the World Economic Forum for the 41st time in the Alpine city in Graubuenden. There are 35 heads of government, 80 ministers and further top-notch politicians from more than 100 countries, surrounded by their entourage and security personnel, about 1,000 company heads, the global economic elite, and hordes of journalists from all over the world. As every year around this time, Davos’ hotels and boarding houses are completely booked out – although accommodation has been significantly extended lately. And it will be extended even further, as institutional and private investors follow suit with new hotels.

Duesseldorf. The new name Business Travel & Meetings Show and the new date in spring are now combined with a new concept, too. The leading German trade fair for business travels enlarges its concept by including the aspects of meetings.