Allianz Partners HK’s Greg Plifka shares insights on innovation in the travel sector

Greg Plifka, Managing Director at Allianz Companions Hong Kong, just lately shared his insights with us on how corporations are leveraging revolutionary options to reshape buyer expectations and experiences.

Plifka, a distinguished insurance coverage skilled with 18 years of in depth expertise within the Asia-Pacific area, specialises in embedded insurance coverage options the place related insurance coverage covers could be provided alongside the enterprise accomplice’s core product inside their present buyer journey.

Beneath his management, Allianz Companions cemented its place as a number one insurance coverage supplier for revolutionary options to the automotive, journey/airline, retail, and monetary service industries in Hong Kong.

On the identical time, Plifka’s deal with constructing easy, digital insurance coverage packages and fostering a customer-centric tradition led to the creation of quite a few long-standing partnerships, making him and a key contributor to the corporate’s continued success.

As a decide on the TDM Journey Commerce Excellence Awards Hong Kong 2025, he delved into how journey suppliers can improve their choices by partnering with business gamers and the way know-how developments remodeled the business to create unique and localised experiences.

Along with your in depth expertise, may you elaborate on how revolutionary options form buyer experiences within the journey, leisure, and hospitality sectors?

Following the pandemic, we’re persevering with to see a digital transformation of journey and tourism, pushed by technological modifications and developments which have redefined buyer expectations. Travellers of right now need options and companies which might be only a click on away, offering seamless journey experiences.

Two key areas the place revolutionary options are enjoying a giant half are personalisation and fixing what we name ‘journey pressure’, in the end bettering buyer experiences and boosting loyalty. On the subject of personalisation, it’s about synthetic intelligence (AI) and information analytics. For instance, offering airline or hospitality workers with visitor particulars and preferences at their fingertips in order that they will present options or provides based mostly on these distinctive wants.

Journey pressure is what all travellers face all through their journey – from planning, researching, reserving, going and even when having fun with the journey itself. What we’ve witnessed is that, particularly after the pandemic, there’s plenty of uncertainty – from vacation spot option to unexpected circumstances like cancelled flights, misplaced baggage, and even well being emergencies while abroad. What travellers need is for journey suppliers to scale back this pressure, and revolutionary instruments could be a part of the answer. For instance, one of many instruments Allianz Companions provides is Allyz, a one-stop-shop digital platform which gives journey recommendation and experience together with built-in companies. Options embody vacation spot itineraries and real-time flight and security data.

In your opinion, what are probably the most vital challenges presently going through corporations within the journey and hospitality industries, and the way can they deal with these challenges successfully?

Customers of right now have gotten extra demanding, anticipating environment friendly and intuitive experiences that ship instantaneous gratification. This immediacy has led to larger competitors amongst journey suppliers for loyalty, prompting corporations to deal with eliminating friction via know-how while sustaining a human contact in journey companies.

For the reason that pandemic, folks have additionally turn out to be warier earlier than travelling with considerations reminiscent of getting sick or caught in a rustic resulting from sudden lockdowns, including to journey pressure. Business gamers have to ease these anxieties and supply peace of thoughts.

To assist mitigate traveller considerations, journey suppliers can accomplice with ecosystem companions reminiscent of journey insurers, as the appropriate insurance policies can deal with a few of these anxieties and reassure travellers from the beginning. Insurers like Allianz Companions present worth via insurance policies that assist shoppers throughout unexpected circumstances reminiscent of flight disruptions and cancellations. We provide clients 24/7 assist with help groups throughout greater than 70 international locations, offering high-tech and human-touch experiences. On the subject of our product improvement, clients are on the centre of every little thing we do, and we use their suggestions and the most recent market information to form our product improvement.

Given your confirmed monitor file, how do you assume sturdy B2B2C partnerships contribute to the development and success of companies within the business?

Partnerships throughout the journey ecosystem are key to making sure seamlessness, which travellers of right now are demanding. Business gamers have to work throughout silos in order that collectively we may help travellers have memorable experiences that can preserve them coming again. What’s essential is that manufacturers are leveraging partnerships which might be complementary to one another, the place they’ve like-minded approaches to innovation, and the place they will proceed to collaborate to search out methods so as to add worth to the client.

As an business, the extra we will do for travellers to make their lives simpler and supply options in a well timed method alongside the best way, the extra loyal they are going to turn out to be. For instance, corporations that accomplice with journey insurance coverage suppliers to reinforce buyer care can differentiate themselves by providing peace of thoughts all through your entire journey expertise, eliminating travel-related considerations together with disruptions and unexpected circumstances, reminiscent of flight delays, private emergencies, or baggage points.

Actually, our clients have informed us that coupling journey insurance coverage with their core merchandise or choices resulted in higher conversions of their core product.

What position do you imagine technological transformations play in influencing the journey business?

Expertise has revolutionised journey and made many points of the journey much more handy, reminiscent of empowering travellers to plan and e book their whole journeys from the consolation of their houses or on the go, managing flights, transport, lodging and itinerary choices.

This additionally makes communication extra instantaneous, and travellers can simply contact service suppliers to troubleshoot any points proper as they crop up. This additionally means, nevertheless, that buyer assist should be extra available to are likely to world travellers who might have considerations and are available from completely different time zones, as they are going to demand responses immediately or inside minutes, with restricted ready time.

Expertise also can assist form the business by serving to to bridge gaps by way of labour shortages and improve journey experiences. In a 2023 examine by Deloitte, half of the resorts and 99 p.c of airport managers surveyed stated that they undertake new applied sciences to handle workers shortages they expertise. It additionally discovered that 74 p.c of airport respondents and 57 p.c of resort basic managers anticipate automation to spice up visitor experiences and in the end their backside traces. Fortuitously, instruments like AI may help to hurry up responsiveness and servicing by assembly clients proper the place they’re.

With extra seamless communication and larger connectivity on-line, journey experiences turn out to be a two-way avenue. Technological transformation has supplied travellers with a voice to share brazenly about their experiences for different shoppers to learn, so there’s much more transparency and openness internationally now. What’s vital is that as phrases can unfold rapidly by way of platforms like social media, business gamers should keep conscious of what clients and travellers are saying, to allow them to act simply as rapidly on suggestions and considerations.

Trying forward, what future tendencies in journey and hospitality do you assume will current the best alternatives for progress and innovation?

Sustainability is more and more high of thoughts for the journey business, together with travellers who anticipate journey suppliers to handle it. Customers have gotten more and more eco-conscious and open to corporations that supply eco-friendly alternate options. For instance, airways can provide cleaner gasoline by way of Sustainable Aviation Gasoline (SAF) or give vacationers different choices to buy carbon offsets. In the meantime, resorts may deal with native produce to assist surrounding communities and reduce their carbon footprint. With shoppers being extra aware of the affect their actions have on the surroundings, the business has alternatives to reply with options that meet shoppers’ eco-conscious wants.

Their choices are additionally fuelled by wanting genuine and distinctive experiences, pushed by post-pandemic attitudes. Travellers are more and more shifting away from typical tourism, trying to find extra personally significant locations and offbeat experiences.

Round 49 p.c of world travellers search immersion in native cultures and merchandise, they usually need personalised experiences and actions. To fulfill this demand, journey suppliers can curate extra native experiences via collaborations with different business companions. For instance, resorts can accomplice with tour operators and nationwide parks to design unique packages.

With distant working right here to remain for the foreseeable future, one other alternative is focussing on digital nomads because the quantity is predicted to extend. These people journey freely and work remotely from internationally, seeing themselves extra as momentary residents than vacationers. Distant employees might not essentially be particular person travellers, they usually might carry their relations like their companions and youngsters. Hospitality gamers may take a look at digital nomad packages, which could be coupled with curated luxurious or wellness experiences for these employees to unwind on their days off.

As a decide on the TDM Journey Commerce Excellence Awards Hong Kong 2025, what are the first standards you’ll use to guage the nominees?

A key criterion for me can be how nominees need to redefine business requirements and elevate buyer experiences. Travelling can current surprising challenges for vacationers and journey suppliers who’re in a position to cut back journey pressure go a great distance in bettering the expertise of travellers, turning them into returning company. With enhanced buyer care, travellers usually tend to have peace of thoughts via their journey expertise in order that they will deal with having an unforgettable journey.

Innovation and the usage of know-how is one other space to contemplate, as know-how will current countless alternatives for nominees to ship high-quality experiences. Examples of know-how making a distinction in tourism embody prolonged actuality (XR) and AI getting used to create novel experiences, utilizing data-driven insights to handle crowd management and guarantee a constructive customer expertise and utilizing digital twins to reinforce occasions. These examples all return to mitigating traveller considerations, making certain that they’ve a easy and constructive expertise while on their journeys.