SiteMinder is heading deep into Chinese hotel distribution with a "strategic integration partnership" with online travel agency CTrip.
The move gives hotels signed up to its RDX platform access to the mammoth Ctrip booking engine.
"The new two-way integration puts the more than 14,000 hotels using SiteMinder’s Room Distribution Exchange (RDX) platform among the first in the world to have direct access to the country’s largest online travel booking channel, via its new XML connection," the company says.
SiteMinder's co-founder and CEO Mike Ford continues:
"This connection with Ctrip is exceptionally exciting for our hotel clients, as they can now leverage this opportunity to attract new guests from anywhere in the world."
Some 80% of Ctrip’s total transactions during Q2 2014 were booked online or through mobile channels, while China’s online travel revenue is estimated to reach around $75 billion by 2017 according to iResearch Consulting.
Ctrip's CEO of Hotel Business Unit and a senior vice president, Maria Sun, adds that its app has also now been downloaded more than 200 million times.
Elsewhere, Ctrip has also bought some new offices - $497 million worth of space in the Zaha Hadid-designed development SKY Soho in Shanghai. Paid for from its existing cash balance, Ctrip said that the 100,000 square metres and more of space will be used to house technology development and business innovation centers.
NB: Circuit board image via Shutterstock.