The 20th edition of South Asia’s leading B2B travel and tourism trade exhibition SATTE achieved immense success. Captains of the industry present at SATTE 2013 were unanimous in their opinion that SATTE has been a great networking and business transaction platform for the sector. The exhibition was inaugurated by Union Tourism Secretary, Parvez Dewan. “SATTE has become an institution; a well-founded one within India and its neighboring countries,” he said in his inaugural speech. He further added that, over the last 20 years, SATTE has been promoting India’s tourism and it has evolved as a truly global exhibition in this part of the world.

Agreeing with Dewan was Alla Peressolova, Head of the Silk Road Program and Fairs Program, UNWTO, who read out a special message by Taleb Rifai, Secretary General, UNWTO. “In the last two decades, SATTE has grown from strength to strength becoming one of the leading networking forums for the tourism sector in South Asia. With the contribution of more participants than ever before, I am confident that SATTE will maintain its reputation. I look forward to UNWTO’s continued collaboration with SATTE,” Peressolova said and added that UNWTO has collaborated with SATTE to promote tourism in this region.

Sajid Desai, Group Director, UBM India, also shared his perspective on SATTE 2013. “SATTE 2013 has successfully achieved its goal. We welcomed 7,419 unique qualified buyers and sellers, excluding repeat buyers and unregistered walk-ins. We had 590 exhibitors from 35 overseas countries and 23 Indian states who met, engaged and interacted with buyers and attendees from over 43 countries and 74 cities of India,” Desai revealed. He also shared that altogether SATTE 2013 received 9,764 appointment requests from visitors and exhibitors. “The feedbacks received from exhibitors and visitors are quite positive and encouraging. Both exhibitors and buyers appreciated our initiative of launching online B2B pre-scheduled appointment scheme,” he said.

Indian states have also lauded SATTE’s contribution in tourism promotion. “SATTE is an extremely vital and beneficial platform for us. This event has helped us showcase our destination to the international markets. We believe in brand visibility and that is what SATTE provides us with. We will continue to participate at SATTE and support it in the years to come,” Sanjay Kaul, Managing Director, Tourism Corporation of Gujarat, said. Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra also echoed the similar opinion. “Madhya Pradesh always sees SATTE as an opportunity to draw private investment to strengthen the hospitality infrastructure of the state. Through SATTE, we are hoping to witness a jump in international arrivals to our state. We want to increase our popularity through this medium and we look forward to participating in SATTE 2014,” Raghwendra K. Singh, Managing Director, Madhya Pradesh State Tourism Development Corporation, said. Dr Jagdish Patil, Managing Director, Maharashtra Tourism Development Corporation (MTDC), feels that SATTE enables MTDC to reach out to the international as well as local travel trade and urges them to promote and sell destinations of Mahrashtra.

Foreign participants also hailed SATTE for providing a wonderful networking platform. “SATTE is a very important platform for Tourism Malaysia to promote our destination in the Indian and South Asian market. We have been very proud to be associated with SATTE over the years and will continue to support the exhibition in the coming years as well. This year it is our privilege to be the principal partner country at SATTE 2013,” Zulkifli Mohd Said, Director- International Promotion, Tourism Malaysia, said. Elizabeth A. Powell, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Tourism, Fiji, also shared similar thought. “SATTE 2013 has been a real adventure. Tourism is a vast industry and to see so many countries participating at SATTE is fabulous. All Fijian companies here have been extremely pleased with not only the volume of people that have been coming but also the quality of enquiries that they have been getting. In terms of investment and return to this event, we will most definitely look forward to SATTE 2014,” she added.

Nancy Powell, US Ambassador to India, graced the inaugural dinner of SATTE at The Ashok, New Delhi. “I am very pleased to be a part of SATTE 2013 along with the Indian and international travel and trade industry. SATTE has become one of the premiere tourism exhibitions in the South Asia region. I want to congratulate the organisers for putting forth such a splendid show,” Powell said in her speech.

Buyers of SATTE 2013 were also equally enthusiastic. “This is my first SATTE experience and I feel that it is well attended both by international and local buyers and also by various tourism product suppliers. I am responsible for the Asian market and that why SATTE has proven to be quiet fruitful for my business, I am pleasantly surprised by SATTE 2013,”Joseph Borg Olivier, Managing Director, Olivair Travel&Tourism, Malta EU, said. Another first time participant, Katarzyna Wymazala, Tour Manager, CTP Nautica, Poland, also received overwhelming response at SATTE. “It is my first time at SATTE and my experience has been a pleasant one. Through this platform, I got a chance to meet with a lot of players of the travel and tourism industry from around the globe. Over the course of 3 days, I have built a lot of business relationships with the exhibitors,” Wymazala said.

Extending his support to the exhibition, Subhash Goyal, President, Indian Association of Tour Operators (IATO) stated: “Over the last 20 years, SATTE has continued to promote the tourism industry massively in India. It has become an iconic show that cannot be missed by the travel and tourism fraternity. We have and will continue to look forward to a great and a successful show every year.”

The companion event of SATTE, SATTE Mumbai West, also received encouraging response from the travel trade fraternity of the region. “Given that SATTE Mumbai West is in the 3rd edition, we witness very encouraging response from the industry. Apart from exhibitors, SATTE Mumbai West, welcomed over 1,300 unique business visitors from cross section of the industry of Western India. We aim to further build up the SATTE Mumbai West in coming years,” Desai said confidently.