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.
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