Singapore Airlines and Alibaba join forces to improve customer experience for travellers

Singapore Airlines and Chinese e-commerce giants, Alibaba, has confirmed a strategic joint venture that is focused on improving the customer experience for travellers by utilising the transformative potential of technology.

The move sees a collaboration between several entities in Alibaba Group’s chain which include Fliggy, Alibaba Cloud and Cainiao Network.

Both Singapore Airlines and Alibaba, in addition to access to over 600mn monthly active mobile users on Alibaba’s China retail marketplaces, will have the ability to explore new benefits for its customers over the retail and travel value chains.

Mr Mak Swee Wah, Singapore Airlines Executive Vice President Commercial, said: “Amid structural changes in our industry, we have been making significant steps to ensure we meet new competitive challenges and deliver on our brand promise to customers.”

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“Enhancing our digital capabilities is one of our priorities, and our partnership with Alibaba Group will be an important element in our drive to be a digital aviation leader. Through Alibaba Group’s advanced digital assets and keen insights of Chinese consumer behaviour, we will be able to better understand the needs of our customers and develop more innovative travel solutions to help them explore the world.”

According to the press release, “the partnership extends across areas such as flight ticket sales, loyalty programs, marketing initiatives, cloud services, payments and logistics.”

Later this year, it is anticipated that KrisFlyer and Fliggy will implement a new two-way points conversion system which will allow its customers to enjoy membership perks from both loyalty programmes, in addition to other benefits such as converting Fliggy points into KrisFlyer miles.