The Association of Travel Aggregators (ATAG) proposes to legally restrict the return of foreign accommodation booking services to the Russian market, including Booking.com and Airbnb. This proposal was made by ATAG Director Alexander Bragin at parliamentary hearings of the State Duma Tourism Committee within the framework of the International Tourism Forum “Travel!“
“Global players have unlimited financial resources, a huge network effect and decades of work on the product. If they return, we will again have monopolization of the market and unlimited access to personal data by foreign structures, with the location of users and their movements. In this regard, we propose a legal restriction on the possibility of global companies returning to our market“, he said.
Bragin noted that some subsidiaries of Western companies are not officially closed, are in a “dormant“ state and, as a result, can quickly resume their activities in the Russian Federation. In particular, Booking.com still has such a “subsidiary“. “We need to quickly prepare legislative amendments regarding tour aggregators, together with the State Duma and the federal authorities“, the expert emphasized.
He recalled that before their withdrawal from the Russian market, Booking.com and Airbnb actually dominated, occupying up to 75-80% of the market. “Over the past three years, Russian participants have completely replaced the foreigners who left, created a truly competitive environment, made significant investments in jobs and product quality for the consumer. Our common goal is to maintain and increase this progress“, concluded the head of the association.
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