Asia

Ticket2Me reports record growth, appoints new CEO

Asia-facing ticketing platform Ticket2Me has posted an annual growth rate of over 109 per cent for the 2018 to 2020 period.

The Philippines-headquartered company returned to pre-pandemic business performance by the last quarter of 2020, driven by cost reduction efforts and a pivot into new technology services, including integrated online event ticketing with live or recorded video streaming.

During 2020, when live events came to a standstill due to COVID-19, Ticket2Me managed to secure major partnerships with the country’s largest theatre companies, including Repertory Philippines and Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA), as well as media and entertainment conglomerate GMA Network.

Darwin Mariano, Ticket2Me founder, said: “Last year almost broke us but we fought back and won. Our survival strategy, informally called Project Cockroach, saw us deliberately incur higher service costs and erode profit margins to ensure that Ticket2Me’s proprietary technology remains the most agile and most secure among the country’s ticketing and video hosting platforms.”

Meanwhile, the firm has appointed Julie Anne Bautista as its new chief executive effective this month, which Mariano claims is “proof of our company’s belief that it is customer-centric reinvention and relentless innovation that will keep us ahead of the game.”

Mariano added: “Julie is smart, on top of her game, understands our business extremely well, and is respected and well-loved by the team; my partners [chief technology officer James Mendoza and chief communications officer Carlo Francia] and I could not have chosen a better successor.”

Bautista will concurrently serve as both chief executive and head of business development. Prior to joining Ticket2Me, Bautista worked at PETA for 14 years, most recently as its marketing and public relations director.

Bautista said: “It’s both a challenging and exciting time for the business of Ticket2Me and for the online and offline events industry in the country. I am under no illusion that it will be easy but we have a fantastic team at Ticket2Me and Darwin prepared me well for the role.

“I am confident that Ticket2Me’s superior technology will allow us to keep leading the market not just against legacy ticketing companies but even against new entrants and copycats.”

Ticket2Me launched an integrated ticketing and video streaming platform in August in the wake of the collapse of the live events industry.

Earlier in March, Ticket2Me facilitated donations intended to supply the country’s health frontline workers with personal protective equipment and other necessities.

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