Carnival Corporation & plc (NYSE/LSE: CCL; NYSE: CUK), the world's largest leisure travel company, has signed an agreement to offer Alipay payment services onboard its cruise ship fleet in Asia, including multiple ships in China. The partnership will enable Chinese guests sailing with Carnival Corporation's brands in Asia to pay for onboard products and services using the convenience of Alipay, China's most popular mobile payment and lifestyle platform operated by Ant Financial Services Group, a related company of Alibaba, the largest online commerce company in China.
As part of this agreement, Carnival Corporation's first and largest brand in China – Costa Cruises – will give passengers the option to use their existing Alipay accounts as a payment method for cabin folios. All onboard spending – including shopping, activities, excursions, food and drinks – will be added to each guest's cabin folio as the purchase is made, and then cleared on a nightly basis via their Alipay account.
Alipay will debut on Costa Serena in China starting in 2017 before potentially expanding to additional ships in the Costa Asia fleet, including Costa Atlantica, Costa Victoria and Costa Fortuna in China, and Costa neoRomantica, which has been homeported in Japan since April of this year.
Based on the terms of the agreement, Carnival Corporation's other leading brand in China and Asia, Princess Cruises, will also have the potential to offer Alipay onboard its ships sailing in Asia, including the all-new Majestic Princess that begins its first homeport season in Shanghai in July 2017 as the first cruise ship tailor-made for the Chinese market. Details of future rollout plans may be released at a later date.
Alipay is China's most popular mobile payment and lifestyle platform with over 450 million users. It presents a significant opportunity for Carnival Corporation to ride on this digitalization trend and provide an upgraded experience for its cruise guests, offering Alipay as an additional payment option for onboard purchases.
Carnival Corporation is the leading cruise operator in China with six ships based in the market across its Costa and Princess brands, representing four million passenger cruise days and nearly half of the overall cruise market in China. Based on increasing consumer demand for cruising in China, Princess Cruises will expand further this year when Majestic Princess will sail on her first cruise from Shanghai on July 11, carrying 3,560 guests to a variety of destinations.
About Carnival Corporation & plc
Carnival Corporation & plc is the largest leisure travel company in the world, with a portfolio of 10 cruise brands in North America, Europe, Australia and Asia that includes Carnival Cruise Line, Fathom, Holland America Line, Princess Cruises, Seabourn, AIDA Cruises, Costa Cruises, Cunard, P&O Cruises (Australia) and P&O Cruises (UK).
Together, these brands operate 103 ships visiting over 700 ports around the world and totaling 231,000 lower berths with 17 new ships scheduled to be delivered between 2018 and 2022. Carnival Corporation & plc also operates Holland America Princess Alaska Tours, the leading tour companies in Alaska and the Canadian Yukon. Traded on both the New York and London Stock Exchanges, Carnival Corporation & plc is the only group in the world to be included in both the S&P500 and the FTSE 100 indices.
In 2017, Fast Company recognized Carnival Corporation as being among the "Top 10 Most Innovative Companies" in both the design and travel categories. Fast Company specifically recognized Carnival Corporation for its work in developing Ocean Medallion™, a high-tech wearable device that enables the world's first interactive guest experience platform capable of transforming vacation travel into a highly personalized and elevated level of customized service.