THE ANNUAL Incentive Travel & Conventions, Meetings Asia (IT&CMA) and Corporate Travel World (CTW) Asia-Pacific will celebrate a number of firsts when they take place this October in Bangkok.

The double-bill event will debut a luxury travel segment this year to cater to the growing demand for premium products among MICE and corporate travel buyers.

IT&CMA will also welcome its very first Middle Eastern offering through Dubai’s inaugural participation in the event’s exhibition segment.

As well, IT&CMA will be attended by buyers from Austria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Egypt, Finland, Israel, Lebanon, Mexico and Tanzania for the first time.

These new features join IT&CMA and CTW’s recent announcement of a closer partnership with the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA), which enables the event organiser, TTG Asia Media, and the association to work together in delivering quality training and seminars for corporate travel managers. (TTGmice e-Weekly, June 13, 2012)

IT&CMA will hold its 20^th edition this year, while CTW is entering its 15^th year.

Meanwhile, an invite-only preview reception for IT&CMA and CTW will be hosted tomorrow at the newly-opened Sofitel So Bangkok.

SRI Lanka’s CeySail Cruises has launched a fleet of luxury Catamaran and Monohull yachts with sea activity options, a move that local tour operators said would sharpen the destination’s appeal to high-end MICE segments.

Rajiv Seneviratne, CeySail Cruises COO, said the luxury yachts would offer activities such as dolphin and whale watching on the east coast of Trincomalee, as well as multi-day trips that include snorkeling, diving and fishing on the south coast.

Prior to the fleet expansion, the company has a Water Sprite 11, a catamaran sailing yacht with four bedrooms for 12 guests and a MacGregor 26 monohull yacht with accommodation for four. CeySail Cruises is looking to add a twin-deck luxury yacht with the capacity for a 100-pax party by this August.

Seneviratne intends to work with travel agencies and hotels to promote his yacht charters and activities.

Ahintha Amerasinghe, managing director of Worldlink Travels, believes that Ceysails Cruises luxury yacht tours and activities will enhance Sri Lanka’s ability to draw deep-pocketed MICE clients and “add diversity” to the destination’s tourism offerings.

CROWNE Plaza Hong Kong Kowloon East has rolled out limited time offers for meeting planners in celebration of its opening on September 28.

Event planners who book their events by end of December can enjoy full- and half-day meeting packages at HK$600 (US$77) and HK$450 per delegate respectively. These deals are valid for groups with 10 to 1,000 participants. Lunch, coffee break and free flow of tea and coffee throughout the event are included.

The hotel is also offering promotional room rates from HK$1,100 per Superior room per night for meetings held between November 1 this year and March 31 next year. Meeting groups that consume 40 roomnights or more each day will be offered one complimentary room upgrade, bonus points for Priority Club Meeting Rewards members and a free roundtrip coach transfer.

Prices exclude a 10 per cent service charge.

Perched on top of the PopCorn shopping mall and Tseung Kwan O MTR station, the hotel has 2,400m² of event space and 359 guestrooms.

BELGIUM-BASED Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) has selected Singapore and Marina Bay Sands as the venue for Sibos 2015, an annual financial services event.

Commenting on SWIFT’s host destination choice, the organisation’s chief executive Asia-Pacific, Ian Johnston, said: “Singapore’s lead within ASEAN creates a strong draw card for customers from South Asia, as well as the Indian sub-continent and North Asia. Sibos in Singapore is a wonderful opportunity to showcase the region to the entire SWIFT community.”

The event, which brings together the global financial services and technology communities, is said to contribute significantly to the economy of the host city and country. SWIFT’s decision to take Sibos to Singapore also adds another feather to Marina Bay Sands’ cap.

John Mims, senior vice president worldwide sales & resort marketing Asia, Las Vegas Sands, said: “This event will be our largest to date, utilising over 120,000m² of space at Sands Expo and Convention Center, including 250 meeting rooms, six expo halls and the Grand Ballroom.

Sibos will be held in Osaka this year, followed by Dubai and Boston in 2013 and 2014 respectively.

A LUXURY watch brand will lay claim to be among the first corporate events to be held in W Singapore-Sentosa Cove when the luxury hotel opens in September.

Several “very good leads” have surfaced in the months leading up to the 240-key hotel’s opening on September 16, with most from luxury fashion and car brands, according to W Singapore-Sentosa Cove general manager, Stephane Fabregoul.

Fabregoul said the W brand’s design-led focus and passion in fashion, music and entertainment had generated a strong demand from related industries.

The property’s location offered a strong proposition to event planners too, he said.

“Sentosa offers a short escape from the city. The experience and ambience is different, and we sell the hotel as a short escape to a world of wow. Furthermore, the hotel’s ocean-facing location means we can offer unique experiences to event attendees. For instance, W Singapore-Sentosa Cove has its own private berths (located in front of the grand ballroom), which gives event planners the opportunity to provide sea access (to delegates) and organise sunset cruises. No other hotels in Singapore can offer that,” he said.

Fabregoul expects Singapore-based clients to make up 60 per cent of the hotel’s events market.

To encourage more event planners to “come and experience” the property, W Singapore-Sentosa Cove has rolled out a full-day meeting deal priced at S$108++ (US$85) per delegate and a group accommodation deal at S$340++ per room. Terms apply and both deals are valid till March 2013. Starwood Preferred Planners will also earn triple Starpoints for events happening before the promotions expire.

THE PHILIPPINE Association of Convention/Exhibition Organizers and Suppliers (PACEOS) will debut a new advanced MICE course in August to improve the quality and competence of local industry practitioners.

PACEOS president Monette Iturralde-Hamlin said the two-day MICE Savvy course, offered by the association’s learning division, the Philippine MICE Academy, will be held on August 16 and 17 at the SMX Convention Center in Manila. Training will be provided by industry experts, and non-PACEOS members are welcomed to enroll.

The course costs 8,000 pesos (US$189) person, and an early bird rate of 7,000 pesos is offered.

PACEOS also reaches out to fresh MICE practitioners through its MICE 101 course, which was held most recently in Manila. PACEOS has plans to take the training session to Cebu and Davao this year, and also to establish a chapter in each of the two cities before the year is over.

Iturralde-Hamlin added that a refresher course on MICE was also offered during every general membership meeting.

Meanwhile, the association is producing the Event Planners Manual, a guide to efficient and effective organisation of MICE events, which is expected to be ready in time for the MICE Savvy classes.

STAR Cruises’ SuperStar Libra has been fully chartered for a 1,000-pax Indian incentive group that will sail out of Penang, Malaysia for a four-day/three-night cruise on July 15.

The group will consist of top-performing distributors and employees from APL Apollo Tubes in India.

The full-charter win for Star Cruises reflects the cruise company’s progress in the Indian MICE market and immunity thus far from the impact of the weakening rupee against the greenback which has resulted in a decline in demand for overseas and longhaul destinations (TTG India, June/July 2012).

Michael Goh, senior vice president of sales, Star Cruises, told TTGmice e-Weekly that MICE-related business in India had grown 20 per cent in 2011 over 2010.

“MICE or corporate incentive groups play an important role in Star Cruises’ growth in the Indian market,” Goh said. “On average, our fleet welcomes about two corporate groups of different sizes every month. These corporate clients come from a number of industries including insurance, cement, pharmaceutical, Fast Moving Consumer Goods and agriculture.”

He attributed Star Cruises’ success in India to the company’s all-inclusive cruise packages, diversity of MICE and other facilities onboard, and close partnership with travel experts in generating demand.

THE INDONESIAN city of Yogyakarta will welcome the 5^th Asian Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction from October 22-25.

Jointly hosted by the Indonesian National Agency for Disaster Management and the United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, with support from regional and international development partners, the event will feature a pre-conference session, high-level round-table meetings, technical sessions led by experts in the subject, and other activities.

More than 1,000 government ministers and high-level personnel from 60 countries are expected to converge for this biennial conference which is organised by rotation in different Asian destinations.

The last Asian Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction was held in South Korea in 2010.

THE THREE-DAY Korea MICE Expo 2012, opening July 3, is expected to draw some 300 buyers, 200 sellers and 3,000 trade visitors, more than last year’s crowd of 251 buyers and 176 sellers.

Most buyers would come from China, Singapore, Indonesia, the US, Thailand and Germany, said Seoul Convention Bureau’s spokesperson, Alexander Paik.

Korea MICE Expo will kick off with the Seoul MICE Forum. Themed The Power of MICE, the forum will explore how business events benefit local economies and boost employment.

The expo will also cater to South Korea’s future generation of MICE practitioners through two programmes – Future Leaders Forum, which will feature a series of talks and round-table discussions designed to encourage students in the international meetings and incentives travel industry to consider careers as meetings professionals; and the Seoul MICE Challenge, a mock-bidding contest for university students.