Walter Schertler - Böcker

This volume contains the proceedings of the conference, ENTER - International Conference on Information and Communications Technologies in Tourism, providing an international forum for the discussion of the role of telecommunication and information systems in tourism, inform potential users and people concerned with the importance of such technologies and to explain their functioning, and finally, intensifying the contact and the communication between researchers, system developers and users. Tourism and leisure industry experiences a fast technological development, however, the different participants in this market are very differently prepared to meet this challenge - for example, big airlines with their reservation systems versus a rather small, structured supplier on the other side.This is the background to the discussion presented in this volume, dealing with questions like how an equal and fruitful co-operation for all participants can take place, when one should participate in this development and enter the electronic market, what are the dangers of entering too early or too late, whether the environment is prepared for such a development, and what can be learned from other sectors?

This volume contains the proceedings of the conference, "ENTER-International Conference on Information and Communications Technologies in Tourism", providing an international forum for the discussion of the role of telecommunication and information systems in tourism, inform potential users and people concerned with the importance of such technologies and to explain their functioning, and finally, intensify the contact and the communication between researchers, system developers and users. Tourism and leisure industry experiences a fast technological development, however, the different participants in this market are very differently prepared to meet this challenge. The general theme of ENTER in 1995 is electronic marketing. This is the background to the discussion presented in this volume, dealing with questions like how an equal and fruitful co-operation for all participants can take place, when one should participate in this development and enter the electronic market, what are the dangers of entering too early or too late, whether the environment is prepared for such a development, and what can be learned from other sectors?The results of this discussion should be of interest to scientists, researchers and practitioners in tourism, as well as in the computer industry.

Within the last six years the conference ENTER (International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies in Tourism) united various experts - practitioners as well as researchers - to exchange their experiences, ideas and visions in the sector of tourism and information technology (IT). The proceedings of the conference provide an international platform to discuss the topical situation and future trends, and the possibilities to shape the own strategies. The following topics are treated in this years volume: knowledge management in tourism - changing consumer behaviour through information technology - using IT to support consumer choice and skills - engineering tourism applications - the empowerment of small and medium-sized enterprises through IT - using IT for hospitality management - using IT to redesign travel distributions and destination marketing systems and IT developments The emphasis of this years contributions lies on the strategic components more than on the technical issues.