Gulliver travels... again!

Founder of Gullivers Travel Associates (GTA), David Babai, is back in business, re-entering the wholesale tourism industry by taking on the chairmanship of G2 Travel.

G2 will concentrate on group travel, with key origin markets being Asia, Middle East, Australia, North America and Europe. The G2 team  believes this market segment will create a sustainable competitive advantage because there is substantial value in the creativity of tour design.

After selling GTA in 2005 to Cendant (which later became Travelport) for $1.1 bn, Mr Babai signed a non compete agreement, which prevented him from re-entering the industry for a period of six years.

Mr Babai says, with growth of emerging economies, comes the desire to travel abroad.

“For the inexperienced traveller, long haul destinations are incredibly exciting but a huge challenge owing to language barriers, cultural norms, difficulty in getting visas or simply the desire to find the food one likes to eat. Our team really understands how to deal with these issues and provide a memorable experience for the traveller at an acceptable price point, whilst earning a fair return for the effort and knowledge required.”

G2’s management team members are all former GTA staff, who have left senior positions in other travel companies to create the start up.

Mr Babai says it is a pleasure to work again with a team he respects and trusts in a business he loves.

The company has offices in Bangkok, Jakarta and London and a head office in Hong Kong.

David Littlefair, heading up the Bangkok Office, says G2 is fortunate to benefit from David Babai’s guidance.

“David is a true leader, a great visionary and an exceptionally astute businessman. When we last worked with him, all of us found the atmosphere extremely stimulating and we were very proud of the business we built.  When the opportunity presented itself to do so again, it was too exciting a challenge to turn down.”