World's first Arabic iOS travel metasearch app launched by Wego

SINGAPORE - Wego, leading travel metasearch site in the Asia Pacific and Middle East, launched the world’s first dedicated flights and hotels travel metasearch mobile app in Arabic for iOS.

“The response from GCC countries to Wego’s fully Arabised site has been overwhelming,” said Mohamad Ibrahim Masri, Managing Director, Wego Middle East and North Africa. “This is particularly true of mobile and tablet users, so it made complete sense to invest in a fully localised version of our mobile app, especially where experts predict an almost 14-fold increase in MENA mobile data traffic by 2018.”

“The app for iOS comes complete with right to left language support (Arabic RTL support for android coming soon), for comfortable navigation of Wego’s extensive global metasearch platform, available in multiple currencies, displaying both local and global air services and accommodation options.”

“Wego was the first comprehensive travel metasearch site to be launched in the Middle East, also in Arabic, at www.wego.ae in 2012,” added Masri. “We continue to build valuable partnerships with local travel tourism businesses in the region including Emirates, Qatar Airways, Etihad Airways, GulfAir, Musafir, ArabRooms and more to be announced shortly.”
Tourism businesses can now also use their own branded version of Wego’s metasearch platform on mobile in Arabic, using Wego's APIs available through the Wego Affiliate Network.

Wego’s free travel metasearch app was recently launched in the company’s core markets and is rapidly gaining traction; ranking number one new travel app in Singapore, China and Thailand, number two in India, and in the top 100 travel apps in 20 countries.

“We’ve had very positive reviews of the application so far and the download momentum is continuing to accelerate,” said Matthew Varley, Wego’s Chief Operating Officer.

“There were a number of challenges that we faced in developing an authentic user experience in Arabic that would meet the expectations of the local market,” Varley continued. “We spent a great deal of time consulting our Arabic speaking colleagues so that every minute detail was reviewed and verified. We paid careful attention to numbers, calendars, currencies and labels and the complexities of tools required for right to left translation, screen transition directions and swipe gestures were all a huge challenge.”

“We’re very proud of our product team, made up of mostly English speakers, who, in conjunction with our MENA colleagues, were able to produce such a high quality app in Arabic which is one of the most challenging languages in the world in terms of translation.”
“Wego has now become even more convenient by providing one of the fastest growing mobile markets in the world with over 400,000 hotel options and over 700 low-cost and full service carrier airfares on mobile,” Varley added. “With the ability to identify last minute hotel and airfare options quickly, along with advanced sorting and filtering options, we believe the app will be enormously popular.”

“Wego is all about saving time, money and travelling more; it’s about convenience. Our growth in Asia, India and the Middle East shows that travellers continue to appreciate how easy we make it to plan and book travel online from anywhere in the world.”

The Wego iOS travel comparison app is available now for free download in English, Arabic, Dutch, French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Traditional Chinese, Turkish and Vietnamese.

Sourced: TravelDailyNews