Will There Be a Unified Wireless Marketplace for Tourism?

The role of 3G services in future tourist consumption will therefore depend on the institutional frameworks that will be developed to deal with the facility-based competition between several 3G networks and the integration of content and services into networks as positioning and secure payment techniques are utilised.

Abstract

The wireless Web services that will be available in the third generation (3G) mobile broadband networks can be expected to have a major impact on tourist consumption and the tourism industry. 3G offers features such as mobility, positioning and secure payment, all of which are likely to boost e-tourism, increase customer satisfaction, and make life as a tourist easier and more enjoyable. However, the ramifications will be different in kind from the changes in recent years as the tourism industry has adapted to a growing use of the fixed-line Internet. Differences in search time and payment techniques will affect market segmentation. Some features of the 3G will burden the process of creating common Web marketplaces for the fragmented tourism industry. Such features are facility-based competition between several 3G networks and the integration of content and services into networks as positioning and secure payment techniques are utilised. The role of 3G services in future tourist consumption will therefore depend on the institutional frameworks that will be developed to deal with this.