China Southern Tapping Into Chinese Internet Market
China Southern Airlines, which sold the nation’s first airline e-ticket, now calculates 20% of its total sales come from the Internet.
Since March 28, 2000 when China Southern Airlines launched its e-ticketing program the airline has sold RMB 4.2 Billion ($5 Million US) in Internet airline tickets.
“Since we first launched e-ticketing in China five years ago, we are reaping vast sales from this incredible technology,” said Mr. Li Kun, Executive Vice President, China Southern Airlines. He added that promoting e-ticketing as part of China Southern’s overall domestic marketing programs, “reduces airline operational costs and helps to offset rising high fuel costs.”
With the large volume of Internet ticket sales, China Southern Airlines has saved approximately RMB 100 Million ($12 Million USD) in operational costs.
On July 20, 2004, the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) published the “14th Statistical Survey Report on the Internet Development in China” in Beijing. According to the report, by June 30, 2004, the total number of Internet users in China has reached 87 Million, which was a 27% increase over the previous 12 month period. Additionally, the number of computer hosts in China increased to 36 Million.
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The bandwidth of International connections has reached 53.9 G, which is a 190% increase over the same period in 2003. Also, there have been 38,2216 CN domain names.
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