ChinaTravelNews – Major OTA Utour announced it will set up a small loans company in Guangzhou with RMB100 million (approx: US$16.1 million) registered capital.
Utour is in a good financial position to offer financial services to SMEs and end users within its outbound tourism business chain via its small loans company – it reported net assets of RMB1.502 billion (approx: US$242 million) and an asset-liability ratio of 37% as of the end of Q1 2015.
Utour is one of the most successful outbound tourism platforms in China
Utour said setting up a small loans company is an important step towards the creation of an outbound tourism financial service platform. It can combine its existing currency exchange service with a new enriched series of outbound tourism financial services to offer its related upstream/downstream businesses and customers a solid financial service base that includes third-party payment, insurance, P2P options and crowdfunding.
Utour will also develop a third-party payment service and set up an online payment platform specifically for outbound tourism.
Utour has also released a three-phase development plan for its small loans company.
The first phase in the first six months of its operation will be dedicated to research. Utour will leverage over 10 years of experience operating a travel business to assist its small loans company to fully gauge the characteristics and risks of the travel industry. The small loan company will come up with its own business model that offers improved financial services for travel businesses by the end of the first phase.
The two years after the first phase will be the phase of development and consolidation. The company will expand its service target, increase the number of its upstream service suppliers and experiment with different products for different types of suppliers while establishing its business model in the second phase. Meanwhile it will develop business credit products for its downstream commissioned business and personal credit products for its customers.
In the third phase, the small loans company will increase its capital to RMB300 million (approx: US$48.3 million) via capital injection. This will enable it to increase loan amounts and extend payment periods for VIP users and also research new forms of financing for the travel industry supply chain while pioneering new markets outside of the travel industry.(Translation by David)
