【Record】Mr. Yu Dunde, Founder and CEO of Tuniu Corporation, delivers a speech at the forum of Tourism as a Catalyst for the Revitalization of the World Economy

Moderator: Now let's welcome our next guest, the founder of Tuniu, Mr. Yu Dunde. You look quite young, Mr. Yu. During the pandemic, China and many other countries have adopted the means of making travel reservations through the network. Tuniu is an OTA, and can you predict what changes there will be concerning the tourist market and people's tourist behaviors in the future development of global tourism?

Mr. Yu Dunde, Founder and CEO of Tuniu Corporation

Yu Dunde: Thanks to the host and thanks to Mr. Wu. Hello, ladies and gentlemen! I'm happy to attend today's activities and forum. First, please allow me to make a report on the recovery of tourism from our perspectives. Globally speaking, the recovery of tourism in China is indeed relatively fast. Local travel has begun to recover since April, May and June, and cross-province travel has returned to normal from July 15. We move to a new stage now in September, and people's willingness to travel has been further enhanced. In the whole process, I am really impressed by the month-on-month growth rate of the whole industry. It can be 100 percent and even 200 percent per month. The growth rate of customized travel is particularly high.

I remember in July, our customized travel registered an increase of 300 percent over the last month. Compared with the same period last year, the proportion of domestic tourism increased from 10 percent to 20 percent, and from 30 percent to 40 percent in March, April and May, and now the whole industry registers a growth rate of 50 percent to 60 percent.

I think having the conference and discussions at such a timing could boost our confidence. I can feel, from September, people's willingness to travel in the coming National Day holiday or even in September, which is off-season for travel, has further increased. People's expectation and desire to travel have been further restored, and their confidence has been further enhanced as well. In addition, their travelling ways have changed a little throughout the whole process. First of all, making a second reservation has become much more common. Before the pandemic, people tended to decide on the travel date directly, and make a payment directly, and get prepared for the travel.

Now most of the travel services support a second reservation. Before going on a trip, people can make a reservation, sign a contract or occupy a seat by means of second reservation, and determine the final travel time just before setting out. Tourists can get a full refund before making a second reservation. They can arrange their travel flexibly based on their own schedule and the overall situation of pandemic prevention and control. Such a way has become much more common.

Secondly, I want to talk about travel products. In the past, different cities have different prices in the travel market. As for the products, we must take the factor of mass transportation into consideration. The cost to a destination differs considering different cities, departure places, flights and means of transportation. Now when people make a reservation, they can directly book a local itinerary, and choose mass transportation while making a second reservation. So as a result, when the product is quoted, or when a client make a reservation, or when the product is introduced, it will be divided into two parts: the local itinerary and the mass transportation, which also gives rise to the implementation of dynamic packaging in the whole process to make a reservation. This is also quite an important feature.

What's more, as you can see, many enterprises, including tourist enterprises, are trying to sell their products by means of live broadcast, which is also a sales mode close to customers. They can interact with tourists more closely in this way. During the live broadcast, tourists can ask directly whether the product can support a second reservation, or whether a scenic site they want to visit, and vehicles are included in the product. That is the case especially when it comes to the number of people in a tourist group. It is quite common before that there were thirty or forty people in a tourist group, but now the number of people in a group is usually less than twenty. Most groups have fewer than ten tourists, and we even provide options of groups with two, four or six tourists. It is also a very important feature we have seen. The number of people choosing group trips is decreasing. Of course, we're also deliberately trying to control the number of tourists in a group in order to meet the need of pandemic prevention, and reduce crowd gathering, which is also a feature we have observed.

We think tourists can have a better travel experience in this way in the future. We also expect there will be more options considering travel destinations.

Thank you.

Moderator: Thank you, Mr. Yu. It is true that the pandemic, the Internet and the 5G technology have not only changed our consuming behavior, but also urged operators to change a lot. Recently Mr. Liang Jianzhang from Trip.com even made cosplay and became an actor. Mr. Yu, do you have any plan like this, or will you make a live broadcast?

Yu Dunde: We do have live broadcasts once a week. Now we have done it for four months with nearly 20 broadcasts. As for cosplay, Mr. Liang is better at it than us.

Moderator: Mr. Liang is really very impressive. So enthusiastic!

Yu Dunde: We do have many differences in other aspects.

Moderator: Indeed, Mr. Yu and a number of tourist industry practitioners, including the aforementioned practitioners in aviation, travel and hotel industries, as well as scenic spot managers, are very enthusiastic. Let's cheer for the whole tourist industry.