The Digital Concierge (www.digitalconcierge.sg) may still be in its pilot phase, but it is already a winner, taking home the Best Deployment of Mobile Technology accolade at the 2008 TravelMole Asia Web Awards. The Digital Concierge is a "personal concierge service" which gives users access to information and services anytime and anywhere, via their mobile phones.

The Digital Concierge is a "personal concierge service" which gives users access to information and services anytime and anywhere.

Launched in June 2007, the Digital Concierge Pilot is a joint initiative by the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) and the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), in partnership with private sector partners Frontline and CellCity.

During the pilot phase which runs until the end of April 2008, the aim is to enrol 5,000 users to try out the service and give feedback to ensure it meets the needs of the industry and visitors. Through these findings, the developers of Digital Concierge hope to achieve these three objectives:

• understand user behaviour so as to better design the Digital Concierge to meet the needs of industry and visitors,
• evaluate the feasibility of delivering service via mobile phone by studying suitable sustainable business models for Digital Concierge, and
• validate content and technology requirements for Digital Concierge.

Mr James Tan, Director, Resource Development, STB, said, "It was very encouraging for the pilot to even have been considered for the award and we are very gratified it has won."

Mr Tan Eng Pheng, Director of the Finance, Tourism, Trade and Manufacturing Cluster, IDA, added, "We are equally heartened by the award conferred by TravelMole. While the pilot met all the objectives we set out to achieve, it also offers many fruitful lessons and learning curves. In the full implementation of Digital Concierge, we will seek to increase its reach to end-users."

TravelMole, a global online community for the travel and tourism industry, presented a total of 11 category awards at its inaugural TravelMole Web Awards for Asia, which was held at the Suntec Convention Centre recently. Known as the "Moscars", winning entries came from around the region, with entries from Australia showing up strongly in the final count.

Digital Concierge clinched the award from three other finalists shortlisted in its category - Irpedia (www.irpedia.com), Yatra (www.yatra.com) and AT&T (www.mobile.com).

Since the launch of the pilot service, new features and services have been rolled out progressively, and feedback being actively solicited from users.

Mr James Tan said users were generally excited with the services provided. In particular, many found the online search useful. The search function offers more than 130,000 listings, and can be customised by users to search for, say, food and beverage outlets based on their preferences. It also displays a map of the outlets' location.

"Feedback from consumers has been positive and we look forward to concluding the pilot stage at the end of the month and working towards taking Digital Concierge to the next level," he said.