Reyes Maroto announces the creation of an intelligent destination platform that places Spain at the forefront of tourism digitisation

During her speech at the forum, held in Benidorm, Reyes Maroto stressed that this tool places technology at the heart of tourism policy: "In 2019 we will connect destinations through the DTI network and in 2021 we want to be more ambitious: to digitally connect destinations with tourists and, in turn, with businesses, in such a way as to generate a unique smart tourism system that will place us at the forefront of tourism competitiveness.

The objective of the platform will be to integrate, relate and combine public and private data to generate more competitive and business led intelligence and thus activate continuous adaptation models, interconnecting and meeting the needs of all agents in the tourism value chain: tourists, destinations and companies. For Maroto, "it is not just the development of a technological solution, it is a commitment to an intelligent and innovative way of working in the public and private sector".

In this way, digitalisation and artificial intelligence are positioned as a lever to modernise our tourism model and 130 million euros will be allocated to this from the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan. The first steps will be the roll out of the DTI self-assessment module, a geo-referencing pilot and linking the whole tourism offering with destination managers, as well as the approval and deployment of the platform model in a set of key destinations over a period of six months.

Smart destination platform

This tool generates a digital ecosystem that will optimise costs and deployment times, facilitating the use of metrics and interconnecting and meeting the needs of all the sector's agents.

For their part, travellers will be able to interact with the destination and its companies through the platform, maintaining loyalty with the offering before, during and after the trip through different channels, such as social networks, the website or apps.

From the destination's point of view, the platform responds to the main challenges they face in their continuous transformation process. From market promotion, tourist information (cultural and activity offer), interaction with tourists during their stay (mobility, waste, security, opening hours and characteristics of services, health information, etc.) to the physical and digital behaviour of tourists with analysis by tourist season, by segment or by applying predictive intelligence.

Finally, for companies, the platform accelerates their business digitalisation process, both in terms of sales and management processes, and strengthens the technical training of their employees. It also provides tools to generate better value propositions and their publication in the best channels for their promotion. Added to this is business intelligence, which allows your situation to be referenced against similar businesses in the destination and other competing destinations.

The project is an initiative that favours technological sovereignty and the competitiveness of Spanish tourism based on profitability, sector cohesion and the generation of knowledge to address the challenge of the digital transformation of Spanish tourism in its social, economic and environmental aspects.

Non official translation