Wall to head online venture for Chinese travel agents

A new online travel company has been formed to service Chinese travel agents, and former CLIA and World Travel Holdings executive Dwain Wall has signed on as co-president and chief operating officer.

The new company, WorldCruise.cn, is based in Beijing and expects to be fully operational by the second quarter of 2015. The bilingual online start up is intended to serve Chinese-speaking travel agents and consumers globally.

“There are currently more than 3 million travel agents in China, but only a few hundred sell cruise product,” said Wall in a statement announcing the new venture. “I’ve been astounded to learn how much opportunity exists for education and growth within the Chinese cruise sector.”

The site will feature a search engine, online booking capabilities, research and FAQs on travel products, shore excursion options, ship reviews, destination backgrounders and limited-time special offers, said WorldCruise.cn, which claims to be China’s first fully integrated travel-planning platform available to the public.

“While online cruise booking and online travel agencies have existed for some time in the United States, Chinese-speaking travelers have never seen anything like this. The best part is that WorldCruise.cn takes what we are doing well in the United States and layers on innovative, proprietary technology to advance the capabilities even further,” Wall said.

The leadership of WorldCruise.cn also includes Steven Donne (CEO and chairman), Jessica Lee (co-President, sales, marketing and operations) and Evgeny Demchenko (chief technology officer).