Cardano’s commercial blockchain arm Emurgo has partnered with Travala, a website that lets its customers pay for hotel stays with crypto. The deal will see travelers around the world easily book for hotel and travel accommodation using ADA. As Emurgo’s official travel partner, ADA users will be given a 10% cashback for all the bookings made with the digital currency till the 31st of July, 2020.
How The Partnership Will Boost The Adoption Of ADA
Travala is a service that offers a more efficient and transparent blockchain-based alternative to hotel and travel booking by integrating cryptocurrencies. As previously reported by ZyCrypto, Travala already allows payments in 28 cryptocurrencies including Cardano’s ADA, Stellar’s XLM, Ripple’s XRP, and Tron (TRX).
In a blog post published on June 30, Emurgo revealed that it has linked up with the crypto-friendly travel booking platform. This partnership is a big deal for two key reasons. Firstly, Travala currently offers cryptocurrency payments in more than 2 million accommodations in 230 countries worldwide.
Secondly, and much more importantly, it falls in line with Emurgo’s devotion towards increasing the adoption of Cardano’s native cryptocurrency, ADA especially now that countries are beginning to lift travel restrictions and lockdowns.
EMURGO partners with @travalacom. As travel begins to gradually resume, those who need to travel can easily book hotels & travel accommodations worldwide using #Cardano‘s ADA on https://t.co/e7gWY4jKDk. Announcement and more details inside: https://t.co/rFY5bhRiYP
— EMURGO (@emurgo_io) June 30, 2020
Emphasizing on Emurgo’s goal to drive Cardano adoption, CEO Ken Kodama commented on this announcement:
“As global travel begins to gradually resume, EMURGO is excited to partner with Travala.com to bring functional utility to Cardano ADA users. Being able to book flights, hotels, and other travel accommodations with ADA at over 2 million properties in 90,000 international destinations demonstrates EMURGO’s focus to drive real-world Cardano adoption.”
The announcement also mentions that 60% of all bookings on Travala in the past one year have been paid for in cryptocurrencies. And with the customers saving up to 40% on their bookings compared to competitors, Travala is poised to take the travel industry by storm.
Travala CEO Juan Otero weighed in on the value of travel in the mass adoption of ADA, stating:
“We’re extremely excited to partner with an industry titan to boost ADA adoption. Travel is the ideal venue for mass adoption of cryptocurrencies and as we all start to travel again, Travala.com will continue to provide a frictionless travel booking experience to anyone, anywhere.”
Cardano’s Move To The Shelley Era Is Right On Track
This partnership comes as the Cardano ecosystem undergoes its biggest upgrade yet. The network will be transitioning from the federated Byron era to the decentralized Shelley era over the next few weeks.
Yesterday (June 30), Cardano successfully deployed the Shelley node to the mainnet as it gears up for the highly-anticipated upgrade that is scheduled for the end of July. Last week, Cardano launched the Hardfork Combinator that will play a key role in the seamless transition to Shelley. This simulated hardfork will basically help prevent the occurrence of an actual hard fork by identifying any bugs.
With the success seen so far, it appears that Cardano is right on schedule for the Shelley era.
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