Skyscanner Enters Asia; Expects 13m Visitors A Month

Leading travel search company Skyscanner Ltd, which is headquartered in Edinburgh, UK, has opened its Asia Pacific regional headquarters in Singapore this week.

Led by Ewan Gray, the newly appointed Director for Asia Pacific, Skyscanner expects to match the rapid growth trajectory achieved in Europe over the last two years, aiming to build the number of visitors to the site from Asia Pacific countries to 13 million per month within the same timeframe – generating downstream revenues for its airline partners of some US$2 billion per annum.

Gray says that Asia is already contributing to Skyscanner’s fast growth trajectory, which is currently 75% year on year. “To date our growth in Asia Pacific has been largely organic, but we are seeing exceptionally strong growth rates from Asia, with yearly increases in traffic of up to 90%. This growth has mainly been from Singapore, China, Indonesia, Japan, India and Malaysia. We expect that growth to accelerate considerably now we will have a presence in each of those markets.”

Skyscanner plans to enter 10 markets in Asia Pacific, and has already appointed market managers for China, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. Active recruitment for market leaders in Korea, Australia and New Zealand is underway. The other markets include Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Skyscanner.net is currently available in Chinese, Japanese and Korean languages. Over the next few weeks, the website will be rolled out in five new languages, namely Tagalog, Bahasa Indonesia, Bahasa Malaysia, Vietnamese and Thai.

Skyscanner is presently the only resource in Asia Pacific where a user can compare flights from all low cost carriers in the region, as well as flagship carriers including Singapore Airlines, Qantas and Air China, and fares from online travel agents such as Zuji and Asia Travel.

He added, “The relationships we have with airlines and OTAs are incredibly important to us and are founded on sending them highly qualified referrals from customers who are happy they have found the very best flight deal available on Skyscanner. We’re looking forward to providing this region with dedicated support to capitalise on the massive potential it presents, building our position as one of the world’s leading travel search sites.”

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About Skyscanner
Skyscanner is a world leading travel search site providing instant online comparisons on millions of flight prices for over 600 airlines, as well car hire deals and holidays. Founded in 2001 by three IT professionals, Gareth Williams, Barry Smith and Bonamy Grimes, Skyscanner is based in the UK with a second office in Singapore. Traffic to the site comes from 244 countries and territories worldwide. With more than 15 million users per month, Skyscanner generates downstream revenues of nearly two billion dollars every year.

Notes to Editors:
1.    The CEO and Co-founder of Skyscanner Ltd is available in Singapore this week for interview. Please contact Illka Gobius to arrange an interview.