Asian Activities Booking Platform Klook Heads to the Americas


Skift Take

Hong Kong-based Klook has selected the Americas as its first stop for expansion outside Asia. To beat the deeply entrenched competition, it will have to find partners that can adapt to the needs of Asian travelers.
Editor's Note: Gateway is a Skift series featuring first-hand, original stories from our correspondents embedded in cities around the world. The logo reflects where the correspondent is based and not necessarily the article's focus. Read about the series here. Travel activities booking platform Klook, which recently took on Goldman Sachs as a new investor, will open an office in the U.S. after sensing a rising tide of Asian independent travelers to the U.S., Canada, and Latin America. Klook plans on having a U.S. team operational from January in either San Francisco or New York. The team will source travel activities in the Americas that fit Asian travelers’ interests, and ramp up outbound marketing. Klook’s president and co-founder Eric Gnock Fah would not go into details on how big the team will be, only saying “the U.S. market is so dynamic, our local team will be moving rapidly and work in an agile way.” “We hope to create a notable impact to both activity providers and travelers in the U.S. by the end of 2018,” he added. “Our [Asian] travelers will start to see more diverse offerings in the Americas from the e