Agoda partners with DerbySoft

SINGAPORE — Agoda Company, an online travel company specialising in hotel discount bookings in Asia, has announced a partnership with DerbySoft, a company that provides connectivity solutions to hotels and travel agents across the world.

DerbySoft’s technology helps hotels distribute last minute inventory and prices updated in real time to preferred suppliers like Agoda. For Agoda’s customers, this means access to rooms in sold-out periods and opportunities for substantial discounts on last minute trips.

Founded in Shanghai in 2002, DerbySoft’s DSwitch is in use at premier properties throughout China, including independent hotels such as the Jianguo Hotel in Beijing, Hong Qiao State Guest Hotel in Shanghai, Tianlun International Hotel in Guangzhou, Grand View Hotel in Shenzhen. Also, chains such as IHG, Hilton, Jinling Hotel Group, BTG-NIKKO Hotels which operate properties such as Jinlun Hotel in Beijing, use the DSwtich to distribute their inventory. Hotel properties are increasingly using such technology to better automate the distribution process.

“We are pleased to connect with merchants like Agoda Company via DerbySoft, so that bookings, prices and availability can be managed seamlessly and in real time, increasing our operating efficiencies,” explains Sun Xiuhua, General Manager from Skyfortune Boutique Hotel in Shanghai.

For Agoda Company, the increase in inventory comes at a critical time. “China’s emergence as a top tourist and business destination in Asia is even more evident in the build up to the Beijing Olympics,” according to Wilfred Fan, Agoda’s Vice President, Business Development. “Access to this platform will give us inventory to China’s most desirable locations when they are most in demand.”

The company offers Agoda websites in 10 languages (half of which are Asian) in addition to Agoda.com. DerbySoft’s CEO, Ted Zhang, commented, “Our link up with Agoda will provide extended reach outside of China, thus enhancing the value of our inventory.”

While the hotel market in China has typically been characterised by offline payment, printed documentation, on-request bookings that can take a few days to confirm and somewhat haphazard check-in procedures, Agoda and DerbySoft see the adoption of these technologies at hotels as a pleasant harbinger of an online future. “Customers should be the ultimate beneficiaries,” said Agoda’s Wilfred Fan.

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