March 25, 2022 - The fifth edition of the 3T Conference – (Tourism, Travel & Tech) took place on March 22, and it was again a success with a mix of topics essential both for the tourism and tech sector. The conference was available online, but it was held live too, which is becoming a trend among more and more conferences nowadays.

Conference director, Oleg Maštruko opened this edition and highlighted this year's programme which connects both the tech and tourism sectors. 

The first keynote speaker Sonja Prvan from DMC Interpit Travel had a lecture on Sustainability and experiences as a booster of the tourism offer. She emphasised the importance of environmental and socially responsible travel and the fact Croatia has all that it takes to be a sustainable destination. 

The second keynote speaker was Jadranka Lovrić from Hrvatski Telekom where she presented the Hotel TV hospitality platform and showed the way how digitalisation can help hotel businesses and practices how hotels can optimize their businesses. 

The following sessions included Examples of the use of AI in tourism by Aco Momčilović from Global AI Ethics and Crowdsourcing methods in participative and sustainable tourism by Hrvoje Bek from Ericsson Nikola Tesla. 

Prior to conference breaks the attendees could hear about using Tik Tok in marketing their products, by Tik Tok business expert Dino Marčac who highlighted the importance of Tik Tok in marketing and the advantages of presenting brands to the Tik Tok community. 

Additionally, Maja Brljačić from Algebra LAB presented examples of successful tech and tourism EU-funded projects and highlighted the fact there are multiple grants and funding SMEs in tourism can use. 

The afternoon session started with a panel discussion on Tourism During Wartime (and other issues in tourism) moderated by conference director Oleg Maštruko. Experts who participated in the panel shared their thoughts on the upcoming tourism season and said it should be successful based on the information they have. Panel participants talked about the importance of continuous education and equal tourism development in all Croatian regions. Furthermore, the advanced use of digital solutions like AI, data mining, sustainability in ecology, and environmental awareness is vital for the further development of the tourism industry. Panel participants included Hospitality Expert at Best Hospitality Solutions Branimir Blajić, board chairman Mon Perin d.d. Massimo Piutti, head of the asset management department at InterCapitalu Krešo Vugrinčić and Marketing Manager at MasterCard Gea Kariž.

After the panel discussion, there were several presenters and topics including Kristijan Walter from Veracompy who presented Huawei Cloud Campus solution in hospitality. Mario Dodig from Robotiq.ai talked about robotization process in the hotel industry. This was followed by Tatjana Glumpak Đruđević who presented an E-charging station – offer of new generation tourists. Co-founder of Revuto Josipa majić gave a talk on Croatia and the SEE region as a global Crypto hub. Goran Gvozden from Poslovna inteligencija and Melita Faraguna Vucelić from Maistra showcase prediction models in tourism. Stjepko Varga from MMC talked about Destination storytelling and showed good examples of media content for tourism branding. Final presenter Ivan Voras from Suroe strasti and Equinox augmented reality discussed a case study on toys, games, and gamers in augmented reality and showed examples from Advent in Zagreb.

As you can see, there was something for everyone involved in tourism or tech, and every year the 3t conference offered answers to questions about what to offer next in tourism and how to deal with daily challenges. If you missed the conference, you could still check out conference recordings here. We are all looking forward to what will season 2022 bring and what can we learn from the next 3T conference. 

Make sure to check out our dedicated travel section.

March 5, 2022 - AI, robots, and TikTok in tourism are all in one place at the 2022 3T Tourism, Travel, Tech Conference in Zagreb on March 22!

The 3T (Tourism, Travel & Tech) conference will bring together speakers to talk about a wide variety of topics, both in-person and online.

3T is a professional conference that unites tourism and IT as the leading and most important branches of the Croatian economy. The fifth edition is scheduled for March 22, 2022.

The keynote lecture will be given by Sonja Prvan, Designer of Responsible Tourism Experience. Her talk "Sustainability and experiences as a booster of the tourist offer" will discuss socially and environmentally responsible travel. They bring greater visibility and sales, but the question arises - how to achieve this and to whom to sell it? For the last three years, the lecturer has been responsible for designing and upgrading new tourist offers to focus on sustainability and responsibility at the Intrepid Travel agency.

Aco Momčilović, a graduate psychologist, HR expert, and doctoral student in Digital Economics, will talk about the application of artificial intelligence, which is slowly finding its way from finance, health, or military applications to tourism. His lecture will discuss how suitable tourism is for AI solutions and whether we already have some good practices.

On the examples of Valamar and Arena Hospitality Group, a solution for robotizing business processes using Robotiq.ai technology will be presented, and the lecturer will be Marko Gudelj, Ph.D. and co-founder of Robotiq.ai.

To move away from "serious" technologies, a more relaxed but very current topic has been announced. The most famous domestic TikToker and one of the ten most popular in the Balkans, 26-year-old Dario Marčac, will discuss applying the mega-popular social network TikTok in the tourism sector. Linking TikTok to Instagram, Dario has over 650,000 followers; TikTok is his source of income, and his business is expanding daily. “With the help of short videos with concise information, the TikTok community allows brands to present themselves in an honest and fun way and make an emotional connection with customers,” Dario says, announcing his presentation.

Free streaming
Tickets are on sale if you'd like to participate. If you want to watch the program via live streaming, you can completely free of charge, but with prior registration. The date of the event is March 22, 2022, and the location is HUB385 or online. You can check out the prominent lecturers and the program here.

To read more about lifestyle in Croatia, follow TCN's dedicated page.

March 30, 2021 - The fourth 3T conference was an online event held last week that covered current topics related to the tourism sector. The tourism experts shared their opinions regarding the recovery of the tourism industry and potential market opportunities.

"When we launched the 3T conference, the idea was to creatively merge the two most important and most successful Croatian sectors - tourism and IT. Last year was hard on tourism, while tech didn't feel the consequences of the pandemic. Although nobody expected 2020 to happen, it might be even better motivation for cooperation between tech and tourism, said Oleg Maštruko, director of the conference.

The first keynote speaker was Hotel Development Specialist Zoran Pejović with the topic "How to keep the best people in tourism in the post-covid world? "Pejović pointed out the disastrous consequences of the crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic related to the loss of talented staff in the tourism industry and sudden fluctuation in other activities, which will leave long-term consequences bigger than the financial losses in tourism. He said that the industry that makes up the largest share of Croatian GDP and connects numerous other sectors could not be non-essential. Finally, he talked about finding and hiring tourism staff according to the old models, which do not correspond to trends in industries that are increasingly applying digital technologies in business. 

The second keynote speaker was Robert Sedlar on Post-covid tourism, who said it would take a longer time to reach pre-pandemic tourism numbers, but this year might bring better results than 2020. After the keynote lectures, participants could hear about Smart hospitality from Siniša Staničić, who showed options for applying digital technologies in tourism.

The central part of the conference was a panel discussion How to Survive after a pandemic? Oleg Maštruko moderated the conversation, and participants were Ivan Gabrić, General Manager for Business Users of A1 Croatia, Gea Kariž, Xborder participated Marketeer At Mastercard, Andrea Andrijanić, Aviation Industry Expert, prof. dr. sc. Domagoj Bebić, associate professor at the Faculty of Political Science, and Zoran Pejović.

The afternoon part of this year's conference program included Trash Talk with the topic "Branding Croatia on the global scene". Dragan Petrić from Bug magazine and famous Croatian chef Mate Janković pointed out numerous shortcomings of branding Croatian tourist offer primarily related to Croatian cuisine. He gave ideas on branding Croatian konoba and various indigenous Croatian dishes that are not yet recognized globally. 

Other lecturers during the afternoon part of the conference included Karlo Guštin, doc.dr.sc. Mirela Holy, Ilija Brajković, Robert Ilijaš, Marko Mišulić and Mosor Prvan. They all covered topics related to tourism sustainability and the potential of new technologies and digitalization in tourism. 

Hopefully, this conference inspired participants to make their tourism business more sustainable and adapt to new circumstances on the global travel market and how to resist the consequences of the pandemic by use of technology. If you want to re-watch the conference you can access it here.

For more about business in Croatia, follow TCN's dedicated page.

March 4, 2021 - The 3T Conference will hold its 4th edition online on March 23, 2021. 

3T – Tourism Travel and Tech conference returns this year for the 4th time and will be available for everyone online. Depending on the COVID-19 measures, it may also have a location for live visitors. On March 23rd, participants will hear tourism and IT professionals who share their thoughts on how to deal with pandemic and post-pandemic tourism. The current situation with COVID-19 and travel opens up possibilities for IT and tech to support tourism activities. The main topics covered will be climate – sustainability – technology and main the conference will try to answer the main question „How to survive after the pandemic?“

The exact conference programme and all the speakers are not yet set, but two keynote speakers will share their tourism and tech thoughts. The first keynote is Zoran Pejović with the lecture “How to keep the best employees in tourism in the post-Covid world?” The second keynote is Robert Sedlar, who will analyse the pandemic's consequences on the tourism sector and offer directions for the future. Additionally, the participants will be able to hear famous Croatian chef Mate Janković and lecture on “How to be great with content and build personal branding on social media?” by Ilija Brajković. 

The panel discussion with the main conference topic will be moderated by Oleg Maštruko, director of the conference. He believes there will be a lot of interest in tourism and tech-related advice. Everyone who works in tourism will need to use technology as a way out of the unprecedented crisis. The conference will try to address some of the following challenges:

Can tourism be sustainable, and how can the development of technology help us?

How to maintain the quality of life at the desired level with the growth of tourist traffic? 

Will VR and AR reduce the need for physical travel to the location?

To participate and learn from experts how to deal with tourism challenges during the pandemic, check out more info on the conference and tickets at 3t.bug.hr.

For the latest travel info, bookmark our main travel info article, which is updated daily. 

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The preparations for the third edition of the 3T– Tourism, Travel and Tech conference are in full swing. The central theme of this year's 3T conference is smart tourism. The third 3T will be held on March 12 at the Kaptol Boutique Cinema in Zagreb.

The conference will feature Miikka Rosendahl as one of the keynote speakers. He will explain how Helsinki won the prestigious title of the Virtual Capital of the World and what Croatian tourist destinations can learn from their experiences. The panel discussion Smart Marketing in Tourism – What REALLY Brings Bookings? will be moderated by Ilija Brajković, and will include Robert Petković, Analytics Lead, Bruketa&Žinić&Gray; Petar Milevoj, Head of Digital Marketing, Maistra; and Tomislav Kosir, Internet Marketing Manager, Hotel Dubrovnik.

Which advertising channels are best for sales? What is producing results and what is not? How can we, and should we, fight Booking and other major players? The conference brings experts on four levels who will share their experiences and give tips on how to do marketing and advertising in tourism.

Natalija Havidić from the Ministry of Tourism will present the project of digitization of public services in the tourism sector.

Another panel discussion, Croatian Tourism in a New Technology Environment: The Limits of Growth, will be moderated by Željko Ivanković, an independent consultant. Although it is the most important local sector, Croatian tourism is lagging behind its competition. This has been established by the study Key Issues of Sustainability of Croatian Tourism, developed by the Polazišta i Perspektive think tank. The reasons for this lag are numerous, but one of the most important is that the development of tourism has not been managed as in competitive countries but has largely evolved chaotically, and the growth is primarily sustained by positive global economic trends. New technologies also influence changes in the tourism offer and demand, the study has established. Their development is not in the local hands, but their application and influence are, at least to an extent. According to analyses, the emergence of new technologies has partly affected Croatia’s lag behind the competition, by neglecting the infrastructure for services for which new technologies have increased demand (festivals, apartments ...). How can the application of new technologies make it possible to reduce the lag behind the competition, and what kinds of application are detrimental to this goal? This will be discussed by the roundtable Croatian Tourism in a New Technology Environment: The Limits of Growth.

Among interesting lectures, we highlight The Mobile Payment Opportunities for Tourism-Focused Businesses by Sara Rasmussen; Digital Tourism Transformation: How to Achieve More? by Karlo Guštin; Distribution of Excursions in Few Clicks by Tatjana Peček; and Roadtrip with Millennials by Krešimir Jusup and Ana Martić.

In addition to this, a number of different lectures, presentations and discussions are planned.

“Helsinki recently won the European Capital of Smart Tourism competition, and I am particularly pleased that we will hear from our guests from the Finnish capital about their experiences in using the technology to enrich their tourist offer. When we decided to organize the first event which would link two of the most successful Croatian industries – IT and tourism – in 2017, it was a somewhat risky move. The excellent response to this first 3T conference has shown us that we have struck a chord with wishes of the experts and the audience,” said Oleg Maštruko, the director of the 3T Conference.

The third 3T will be held on March 12 at the Kaptol Boutique Cinema in Zagreb. The number of participants last year was 280, and the same number is expected this year.

More information and registrations are available here.

A report from the last year’s 3T can be found here.

More news about Croatian tourism can be found in the Travel section.

After the great success of last year's premiere 3T conference – Tourism, Travel and Tech, Bug magazine is organizing the second edition on March 20, this time in the luxurious setting of the Boutique Cinema Kaptol in Zagreb