Innovation for tourism, without forgetting to place humans at the centre

Innovation, digital-physical coexistence, hyper-personalisation, strengthening of Public-Private relations and a push towards the slow tourism. These are the priorities for relaunching the world of tourism, thoroughly tested during the pandemic and grappling with many unknowns also for the months to come. This whilst not omitting the needs of humans, which must remain at the centre of new value propositions. Once this moment of transformation has passed, when we will be able to return to tourism as we knew it, the technological aspect should not override and substitute the human element, but rather act as a complementary enrichment and necessary support, simplifying access to and use of certain services or tourist attractions. Digitalisation and creativity can in fact be means by which tourism comes ever closer to citizens. To summarise, innovation is the polar star for restarting tourism, through investing in an Italian ecosystem consisting of start-ups, small and medium-sized enterprises and new solutions powered by Open Innovation and Technology Transfer programs where Research, Business Communities and the Public collaborate actively to define innovative solutions for all tourist operators and in line with the security and personalisation needs of the tourists. The Next Generation Fund represents an unprecedented opportunity to support tourism, insisting on innovation and sustainability: Italy – home of world-renowned tourism – has what it takes to do this successfully, establishing itself as leader of state-of-the art tourism in the European and global scenes.

Thanks to innovation, the world of culture and tourism did not stop even during total lockdown, witnessing the birth of several digital initiatives. In a leap of virtualisation, many museums have since “relocated” online, flanking the “traditional” viewing of works with an offering of interactive additional services. Nevertheless, the future trend cannot be totally virtual: the common denominator of new value propositions is the coexistence of the digital and the physical, where the digital enhances or enables the experiential part. In fact, as emerged from the research presented during the Innovation Summit 2020, only 13% of interviewees stated a preference towards using services in a totally digital way when it comes to museums, cinemas and theatrical shows, while 44% of the sample is in favour of a hybrid model.

Tourism is one of the founding pillars of the Italian economy and of its famous “Made in Italy” brand: as stated in the latest draft of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, in the “new normal” it will be necessary to focus on the potential of the country in terms of scenic beauty and cultural heritage. We will need to reactivate tourist flows, not just from abroad, where presences had reached almost 218 million incoming tourists in 2019, but also among Italian tourists– 215 million presences in 2019 – proposing a national offering that is increasingly personalisable and innovative, but above all sustainable and accessible. Therefore, if in a first phase we focused on responding to an immediate need and recovering what was lost due to the closures, maintaining a connection with tourists and visitors, it is now time to rethink Italian tourism along the lines of innovation and sustainability, acting with a structured plan that leverages the Next Gen EU. This is the next challenge to win.