TSG Tourism Services Group will assist with facilitating destination marketing and housing services for the International Astronautical Congress (IAC) 2011 that begins on October 3 in Cape Town.
To be held at the Cape Town International Convention Centre, the event will be the first international space congress to be hosted in Africa.
Jonathan Weltman and his team at TSG Tourism Services were instrumental in securing the Cape Town bid for the 62nd IAC that will attract 2 500 delegates.
The company was approached in 2008 by the South African Astronomical Observatory (SAAO) to help develop a bid to bring the conference to Africa for the first time.
Says Weltman: “CityGuideSA – a wholly owned subsidiary of TSG – had previously assisted SAAO with corporate travel services and they approached us with the request to help them co-ordinate a bid to bring the conference to Africa.
With less than three months lead time, we co-ordinated the bid, working closely with SAAO, the City of Cape Town, Cape Town Convention Bureau and South African Tourism to develop a compelling bid which we presented and won at the 59th IAC held in Glasgow.”
TSG Tourism Services Group is a business-to-business company connecting travel intermediaries to tourism service providers by providing them tourism services and technologies.
TSG facilitates and provides solutions across the tourism industry. Clients include PCOs, event and festival organisers, travel agents, tour operators and website channels.
TSG has designed a mobile application for the IAC 2011. The application can be used as a standalone or pre-loaded program with a commissionable rated hotel and tour inventory.
Delegates will have access to registration, accommodation and tourism booking services which integrate with the congress website. The application includes an RFID scanner for PCOs using scannable badges, as well as a free website application that can be plugged into any congress or event website.
Explaining the usability, Weltman says, “Dynamic updating ensures that delegates receive regular congress schedule revisions, as the PCO is able to update this remotely. Updates automatically transfer to the built-in calendar function of the app, making it easier for changes to be made to the program where necessary – a functionality that is impossible to achieve on a printed programme.”
The congress will be held in the CTICC from 3 – 7 October. For more information visit www.iac2011.com
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