• 40 out of every 100 Spanish capital hotels in the Caribbean have a contract with Dingus, a percentage that allows us to focus our attention on the countries in the area where we operate in order to provide them with a season in the best conditions. As suppliers of technology for tourism, we have been strengthening the distribution map for months and working with the operators that are currently in the best conditions for the reactivation of the issuing markets for Mexico, Dominican Republic, Jamaica and Cuba. Expanding the integration capacity seeks to strengthen the marketing and sales capacity of the hotel industry, increasing the value of the technological business platform proposed by Dingus

While Europe succumbs again to the advance of the pandemic and the different affected countries close borders or limit activity and mobility, Dingus customers in the Caribbean with hotels in Mexico, Dominican Republic, Cuba and Jamaica reopen or keep the accommodation plant ready for the season. Regardless of the health provisions in each establishment and initiatives for the recruitment that include, for example, insurance against Covid-19 for tourists in different destinations, the coming months require an operation with which we have aligned ourselves in three strategies: expansion of integration capacity, acceleration of technological response and knowledge and business generation. The moment is complicated from any aspect that is analyzed, from the strictly sanitary to the geopolitical and economic, and the scenario is redefined almost daily. But certainties such as the fact that 40% of the hotels with Spanish capital in the Caribbean, 45% of the global ranking Hosteltur 2020 and 43% of the ranking of hotels with presence in Spain trust Dingus as a technology provider, reaffirms us as a partner and ally of the hotel sector.

Expansion of integration capacity

Practically one new channel per week: that is the rate at which we are currently expanding connectivity. However, it is not a question of adding operators to the list of channels, but of considering the integration capacity of each solution in order to offer all the flexibility and versatility that the market requires. Milena Galindo (Business Development Manager – API Market/Connectivity & Partnership Manager) highlights “a fairly consolidated presence in Canada, as we have integrated the main local operators working with destinations in the Caribbean. This is the case of Transat, Sunwing, WestJet and, currently under development, Air Canada. In the United States the coverage is also quite extensive, either directly or through collaboration with local companies that integrate some operators”. However, obtaining direct integration with the main players operating in the Caribbean area “is one of the main objectives of Dingus for this market. In this way, the integration with Apple Leisure Group, which is in a pilot phase, in one of the most important projects of the connectivity department at the moment”.

Galindo also highlights the integrations with local Mexican channels and other Latin markets “especially Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Colombia. We have a consolidated -and growing- presence of Latin American channels in our distribution map, whether they are OTA, dmc, Tour Operators and local B2B integrators”.

The fact: out of a total of 310 channels, we have 106 in America (North, Central and South). Bearing in mind that in many cases we count the integrator and not the whole portfolio of channels connected through it, the number of real integrations exceeds 500.

Accelerating technological response

The CEO of Dingus and co-founder of Hitt Group, Jaume Monserrat, considers that “the common denominator in which all the approaches to recovery and reactivation coincide refers, in one way or another, to digitalization and the need for deep transformation of business processes“. Assuming these approaches, “in the company we have changed our strategy for the next two years with the aim of focusing investment on innovation, designing an agenda that allows (in a ‘short’ time) to put on the market a pool of solutions and services designed to maximize economies of scale, reducing operating costs and service increases in terms of security and warranty“.

Monserrat explains that “we are already working very actively on forming a fully integrated business platform offer, which reinforces the client’s vision. For that purpose, procedures and clients’ experiences are being redesigned, from a strategic approach clearly oriented to omnicanality”. What Dingus seeks is “to build loyalty not only through quality and reliability in service, but also through innovative capacity in the form of rapid technological evolution”, becoming a valuable stakeholder in the strategies of our customers, immersed in the processes of digital transformation.

Caribbean approach: Dingus continues to invest in expanding markets for our clients in the area, increasing the possibilities with the USA and Canada and the leading channels that choose us for our technological capacity, security and catalog of hotels in the destination. For their different recovery strategies, we dedicate more resources and offer more integration capacity than ever.

Knowledge generation, business and data security

The marketing and distribution of tourist accommodation has become one of the axes of the hotel business, but no longer the only one. Now it is considered essential, for example, to manage data. And not just any data, since as the CIO of Etoolinnovation and co-founder of Hitt Group points out, “if a company is not processing its own data to help in the decision making process, it will end up buying other people’s data, and even buying prediction models from third parties to make its decisions… the one that does not rely on its data and that of its context, will therefore be making decisions at a clear disadvantage“. All of this, says Emilio Torrens, when “customers claim to be 100% sure that their data is private and safe”.

Maintaining these high levels of information security, preventing attacks, leaks and theft, as has unfortunately happened recently in recognized suppliers of technology for tourism, is one of the main commitments of Dingus embodied in the PCI Compliance Service Provider Level 1 certification with which we protect our technology services and ISO 27001, an international standard that allows to ensure data and information (as well as the systems that process it) with confidentiality and integrity.  What we do with the secure information, in addition to providing peace of mind to operators, hotels and guests, is generate parameters to measure the activity, follow the evolution and allow the adoption of the most appropriate strategies in each destination and time. In this way, our DataHotel tool has allowed us to know how the pandemic has been affecting the hotel activity. And what is more important, to share that knowledge so that the hotels integrated with Dingus adapt to the changing scenarios and can design the most appropriate strategies in each one.

Paula Servera, business development manager, appreciates “the opportunity we have had to tell our clients what was happening or could be expected every month. The most valued thing by those who have given us their feedback, is the possibility of knowing the reliability of the reservation based on the actual cancellations and confirmations, establishing which client, what type of accommodation and which stay was having better or worse behavior, and by which operator the sale arrives”. In this way, and if we compare 2019 with this year, to date, we see how “in the Dominican Republic, Jamaica and Cuba, cancellations in general exceeded 80%. In the Caribbean, and with regard to our client portfolio (with a different evolution of the pandemic than in Europe), the months of September and October were the ones with the smallest decreases in roomnights, always with those comparative 2019-2020 data analyzed between March and October of this year”.

Confidence in the future: the great opportunity for the Caribbean destinations is marked, without a doubt, by the enormous market of the American continent, the desire of North American and Canadian tourists to travel, the established health and mobility policies, as well as by the important plans of attraction that our hotels are making in the area. And of course, the enormous quality of their lodging offer and the perspectives of an effective vaccine in the next months.