Singapore, 18 July 2008 – Abacus International, Asia Pacific’s leading travel facilitator, has been accorded the ‘Best E-commerce and New Technology’ and ‘Marketing Team of the Year’ awards at TravelWeekly Asia’s annual travel industry awards.

More than 2.2 million votes were cast for the travel publisher, TravelWeekly Asia’s annual industry awards this year.

Abacus International President and CEO Robert Bailey said, “It is a great honour to achieve these awards. Being recognised as the industry’s leader in ‘Best E-commerce and New Technology’ and having the “Marketing Team of the Year’ show that the investment and effort by the Abacus team in both developing new solutions and communicating these through effective marketing is greatly appreciated by our industry peers.”

“In a changing market times where technology and e-commerce occupies a central role in business operations and customer interactions, it is important that Abacus empowers key travel suppliers and network of travel agencies in 25 markets with the necessary tools.”

Over the past year, Abacus has launched numerous firsts in travel distribution in the new technology and e-commerce space. This includes the launch of Abacus ClientBase, a sophisticated CRM solution that helps travel agencies develop closer relationships with their customers and the launch of Abacus VirtuallyThere, a one-stop mobile travel updates service.

“Not just one award, getting a second award as the ‘Marketing Team of the Year’ is a great testimonial for our marketing team. Their ability to think outside of the box and develop ideas that have yet to be adopted within the industry has put us a step ahead of the marketplace.” added Robert Bailey.

From the launch of Abacus ClientBase, Abacus International Conference, the annual Abacus Hack Day to the most recent corporate responsibility effort in offsetting carbon through a tree planting day with SouthWest Community Development Council, Abacus’ marketing team has rolled out innovative and meaningful events and campaigns and shown that the company takes interest beyond the usual travel business parameters.  

“The TravelWeekly Awards are timely with the celebration of our 20th year of success in the region’s travel sector. These awards are great encouragement for us to keep delivering innovation for the travel distribution market and we thank our key industry partners and readers at TravelWeekly for their great show of support.”

The annual TravelWeekly (Asia) Travel Industry Awards is an opportunity for the Asia Pacific travel industry to recognise its peers for their outstanding achievements and contributions to tourism. The awards were presented at a gala cocktail event at Marriott Hotel in Singapore last night.