Demo Europe experts advice travel startups to find their niche

Technology and investment experts said at Demo Europe conference in Moscow that one of the ways to success for tech startups in tourism services is to develop niche products with personalized content or services.

Demo is one of the oldest technology forums in North America, which has been held for more than 20 years. A similar European forum Demo Europe, which takes place on June 3-4 in Moscow's Digital October, is held for the first time this year. Several hundred startups from 10 countries including Russia, the UK and the U.S. applied for participation. Following the selection, 30 projects got the opportunity to conduct a six-minute demonstration of their products to potential investors, and 20 projects – a brief 90-second presentation of their ideas.

The presentations were assessed by a jury of three experts – the Vice President for Technology of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development Bahroma Ibragimov, the director of Intel Capital Russia Maksim Krasnyh and the senior manager of Technology and Innovation Center of PriceWaterhouseCoopers Company Natalia Rodionova. They note that online travel startups need to find additional value of their projects besides simple aggregation of the market offers, determine their own competitive advantages and develop a monetization model.

Speaking about trends in the online travel market, Ibragimov said that a prospective niche for startups is to give users the information about activities available at the destination. The future of the market is in specific applications with content aggregated to meet the user needs – Krasnyh said.

According to Rodionova, travelers need niche products that form their travel experience providing content on interesting places, activities, and allowing you to conveniently plan your time during the trip.

Developers also demonstrate their cloud technologies, products for document management, mobile and multimedia solutions to the Demo Europe experts.