Timothée de Roux left Abritel for a brand new project supported by the Banque des Territoires and the French government.
Many professionals have tried to develop a platform dedicated to France as a destination, without any real success. Around wants to take up the challenge. This new platform will be presented at a press conference on September 30 by Olivier Sichel, Director of Banque des Territoires (Caisse des Dépôts Group), and Timothée de Roux, President of Surroundings. Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne, Secretary of State for Tourism, will take part in this media launch operation.
What do we know about Surroundings? It is a simplified joint-stock company officially created in April 2021. Christian Boutin Sanchez, Fernando Cuesta Ruifernandez, Lilian Lancelot, Benoît Parizet, Philippe personne, Magali Prevet, Antoine-Xavier Troesch are directors. According to our information, the project would have a small war chest of 35 million euros.
An embryonic site
The Alentour-france site is embryonic for the moment, but already provides guidelines. “Around connects leisure activity professionals with hotels, campsites, lodges, inns, bed and breakfasts, and tourism institutions so that visitors can instantly book a rich and varied range of local activities”, explains the platform. -form. “Digitalize your activities, benefit from new distribution channels at lower cost, fill your seasonal wings and increase your income while securing your margins,” he promises.
Surroundings is committed to developing partnerships “with tourist accommodation and tourism institutions in all regions of France”. On this point, the experience of Timothée de Roux (ex-Abritel/HomeAway and Les Collectionneurs, and member of the Interministerial Committee for Tourism until April) will be an asset. Amadeus and Dawex are presented as technology partners to facilitate the promised connectivity. Even if the pitfalls of past projects have shown us the immense difficulty of the undertaking… Guaranteeing the online booking of a myriad of French tourist service providers remains a challenge.
Counter foreign platforms
The project is part of a global tricolor dynamic. In the “recovery plan” for tourism announced by the President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron, digital occupies a place of choice. “Digital technology is at the heart of tourism today, ” he said in June 2021 . We reserve digitally, and it is sometimes foreign platforms that capture the value,” he added, referring to the regulations and taxation that are applied to them. Without ever mentioning Booking and other Airbnb, leading platforms in France for accommodation, and offensives in the field of activities.
Faced with this international competition, the government wants to help French tourism companies to digitize, he said. The objective is also to “build our French platforms ourselves”, and therefore “to have a French offer for French tourists and foreign tourists (…) while keeping value in our country as much as possible. This is the strategy we are going to deploy. »
Of which act it seems…
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At Abritel, Timothée de Roux will not be replaced door for position
Timothée de Roux had been general manager of Abritel since 2016, a position he left a few months ago. “France remains a key market for us and will continue to benefit from a regional management team, but there are no plans to replace this specific role”, tells us the communication department of Expedia, owner of HomeAway. . “Abritel continues to offer the same level of quality service and support to holidaymakers and owners in France as we have for over 20 years. Last year, the Expedia group underwent a major restructuring. “At the same time, like all travel companies, Expedia Group suffered a significant drop in bookings at the outbreak of the health crisis due to Covid-19”, reminds us of the communication department. “While we have worked hard to save jobs, these changes are a continuation of our streamlining efforts. »
