The Meeting, Incentive, Conventions, and Exhibitions (MICE) industry is one of the most complicated, interrelated, and intersectional complexes. It is a new form of business tourism that is also the fastest growing section of the international tourism market. It caters to various forms of business meetings, international conferences and conventions, events and exhibitions, and is slowly but steadily capturing every big hotelier’s attention. The importance of the MICE industry lies in the fact that it converts business meetings and conferences into more glamorous and enjoyable events for the delegates and attendants.
International MICE industry statistics
- Active in 140 countries
- 610 million business trips per annum
- 100,000 new jobs are created every time the industry’s turnover increases by USD 1 billion
- USD 2 trillion annual profitability expected by the year 2020
Cybage’s T&H practice comprises an ever-growing number of more than 500 professionals working in areas that are directly or indirectly related to MICE. For example, hotel booking, E-RFP, GDS connectivity, air ticketing, airfare consolidation, channel management, packages, in-room entertainment, and many more.
Meetings
In meetings, people come together at a common place to confer or carry out a particular activity either on an ad-hoc basis or according to a set pattern. As per an IMEX study, content now defines meeting types wherein it will be delivered in ever more entertaining, diverse, and most importantly, digestible pieces. Technology is important, but ‘how it is delivered’ is even more important. The proliferation of mobile devices with their innate ability to capture data will improve ROI.
Cybage has been gaining expertise in the Meeting space by virtue of being involved with clients such as NFS, Freeman, and others. We have been working with NFS for the past several years to build systems (both desktop and mobile) that allow users to schedule meetings, reserve resources such as AV, meeting rooms, diagramming and layout of venues, among numerous other features.
Capabilities
Following are some of the areas in which Cybage has extensive experience:
- Booking engine for meetings addressing the who, where, when, and what
- Resource management; for example, rooms, AV, catering, and transportation, among others
- Support for multi-property, multi-language, multi-time zone, and multiple currencies
- Mobile interface with native support for iOS and Android
- Diagramming and layout