Chinese travel giant Trip.com bets on Apac growth as it looks beyond home market

[SINGAPORE] Once synonymous with China travel, Trip.com Group wants to distinguish itself as a service provider for customers from Asia who want to travel within Asia, in the next three to five years.

“And if you become No 1 in Asia, in theory, you’re No 1 in the world already, because Asia grows the fastest,” said chief executive officer Jane Sun.

In the third quarter ended Sep 30, 2025, the group posted net revenue of 18.3 billion yuan (S$3.3 billion), up 15.5 per cent from the year-ago period’s 15.9 billion yuan, reflecting robust travel demand.

International bookings grew by around 60 per cent on a yearly basis, with the Asia-Pacific region remaining the largest contributor, rising more than 50 per cent.

Revenue from outside China is growing fast because of the much bigger market size and Trip.com’s strong service orientation, said Sun. With its significantly large population, strong economic growth and rising middle class, the region offers many opportunities for tourism.

To strengthen its foothold in Asia, the group will put in place its “internal formula” that has built its success in China, she added.

Success strategy

This begins with being “way ahead of anybody else” in the service and branding elements, because these are “very difficult for the other players to copy”, she noted.

Leading in service could mean being connected to Trip.com’s call centre within 30 seconds from anywhere in the world, and having someone speak to you in your native tongue, she explained.

If any conflict were to arise during a customer’s travels, Trip.com should be able to reach out to them, ensure their safety, and make arrangements for their return.

“And with that service, we build a very strong brand,” Sun said.

She recalled an expensive pre-Covid 80-day global tour package from Trip.com that rapidly sold out. “How many brands would you trust by giving them US$200,000 within 17 seconds? Very few, right? So that’s why service branding is very important.”

That is why it is investing in improving its brand awareness in “very new sites”, including Thailand, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines, she added.

Sales and marketing expenses rose 23.6 per cent on the year in Q3 2025, which Sun mainly attributed to international expansion.

Flight and hotel bookings remain the main driving force of the overall business, with corporate travel, vacation packages and “other ancillary businesses” making up a smaller but faster-growing share.

On travel trends that the group has its eyes on, Sun named the “three Es”: events, elderly friendly and emerging markets.

Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour proved that travellers are willing to organise trips around concerts, and that these people will naturally need places to stay, she said, highlighting the Olympic Games and Formula One races as other examples of events that young people in particular travel for.

“It’s changing the whole market for lifestyle,” she added.

Beyond event travel products, Trip.com is also introducing more varieties of “themed” holidays, such as ski trips and dive trips, as well as experiential travel with cultural experiences.

As for elderly-friendly offerings, Sun noted that older people who are retired can spend a longer time – and therefore spend more – on holiday. This gives Trip.com’s destination partners more opportunities to sell to them, she said.

Flagging the importance of understanding different consumer preferences, Sun suggested that older customers may prefer to wake up early, nap in the afternoon, and go to bed earlier, compared with young people.

The platform thus works with partners to design products tailored for these customers, she said.

In 2024, it launched the Old Friends Club to cater to travellers aged 50 and above. The number of Old Friends Club members and their total gross merchandise value rose more than 70 per cent in Q3 2025.

More AI

When it comes to technology, Trip.com is investing heavily in artificial intelligence (AI), which is used across the company, from front-end interfaces to back-end operations.

Trip.Planner, for example, is a “one-stop shopping platform” that uses AI to scour the group’s offerings and personalise recommendations for hotels, flights and attractions to visit. It can take into account travel partners, travel style and pace, and budget constraints.

It also allows travellers to make bookings directly on the platform, and the first-party data ensures the suggestions’ accuracy, explained Sun.

Using AI in customer service has resulted in more tailored support and better efficiency, she added. And generating audio, video and pictures with AI has made creating content for marketing much faster and cost-efficient.

Operationally, AI has increased productivity, with coding work that used to take five days being completed in just one or two now.

AI development is an ongoing process, that can be used to fine-tune products and not always to achieve major breakthroughs, said Sun.

Finally, the last component in Trip.com’s success is its pricing. As a large player, it can negotiate the best prices for its consumers, she said. “But we never brand ourselves as the lowest price leader.”

This is because this strategy attracts those that are very price-sensitive. Instead, the group wants to be seen as having excellent services for the best prices – value for money, rather than cheap.

And despite the impact of geopolitical tensions on tourism flows, Sun is not worried. 

“Consumers, if they have time, if they have money, they will travel,” she said. “As long as people are travelling, we should be okay. The world is a big place.”