Baidi Li, Former Viator Exec, Joins Magpie

Magpie Travel, the San Francisco-based company offering content management solutions for the tours and activities sector, announced the appointment of Baidi Li as Head of Growth Initiatives. Li joins from Viator, where she served as Regional Director for the Asia-Pacific, Middle East, and Africa regions.

A Strong Industry Background

Magpie CEO Christian Watts highlighted Li's deep understanding of the content management challenges faced by OTAs and resellers. While Magpie's system was built to deliver substantial benefits to operators, the advantages are even more significant for resellers managing tens of thousands of products, constantly focused on content quality, and always seeking new and interesting operators.

Li will concentrate on new product initiatives and provide strategic focus on the Asia-Pacific region, where operators are preparing for a return to normal operations and face enormous work updating product content for distribution -- including adding COVID-safe information to every listing.

Career Background

Li's career spans China, the United States, and Singapore. Since 2012, she led the Viator and TripAdvisor Experiences supply team across the Asia-Pacific, Middle East, and Africa regions, helping travel operators and experience providers reach global audiences.

Li expressed enthusiasm about joining Magpie, noting her long-standing interest in finding more innovative approaches to content creation and distribution. She described current methods as tedious, inefficient, and resource-intensive -- challenges that Magpie's focused approach to content management is designed to solve.

While acknowledging the difficulties facing the travel industry during the pandemic, Li also sees it as an exciting time. Operators and resellers are actively seeking innovative tech solutions to drive growth as the industry recovers.