In the context of globalization, the sphere of tourism becomes more and more important, since it is one of the most profitable and dynamic branches of the world economy of the country.
Tourism contributes to the growth of employment, accelerates the diversification of the economy, because this sphere covers more than 50 branches of the national economy, therefore the innovation of the tourist sphere should become its constant component. In addition, tourism not only preserves, but also develops the cultural potential of the country and the population, harmonize relations between different peoples and contributes to the friendly use of the environment.
Indicators of its profitability indicate the importance of tourism for the development of economy, namely: 8% of world exports and 30% of world services sales, as well as annual growth of world tourist flows by 4-5%.
However, Ukraine loses significantly in the competition, lagging behind the leading countries of the world in terms of development of tourist infrastructure and the quality of tourist services. Financial and economic crisis that has been continuing in recent years, the events associated with annexation of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and anti-terrorist operation on the territory of Donetsk and Luhansk regions had a negative impact on the tourism flows, the tourism structure and tourist opportunities of the country both on the domestic and the external tourism market. In addition, Ukrainians have recently received the possibility of visa-free travel to the countries of the European Union, which will also lead to the increase in outbound tourism, and a reduction in the entrance.
In this regard, it is necessary to introduce innovations in the development of tourism in Ukraine in order to attract visitors.
Innovation in tourism "involves developing an original approach, developing new ways to use existing resources while seeking new ones";. Typization of innovation in tourism is developed by Abernathy and Clark, who distinguish 4 types of innovations: regular, niche, revolutionary and architectural. Regular innovations refer to the continuous improvement of the quality of services, the improvement of personnel skills and productivity. Niches innovations usually change the structure of cooperation, but not basic knowledge and skills; they combine existing services in a new way. Revolutionary innovations are associated with the use of new technologies in firms, the development of new methods; they have a radical impact on the key knowledge and skills of the staff up to the appearance of new occupations in the sector. Architectural innovations change the structure, business model and rules in tourism; they create new events and objects that require reorganization, chang physical or institutional infrastructure, research and training facilities.
One of the main directions of innovation is the development of sustainable tourism. Destination (tourist areas) are beginning to create a management system for tourism resources and use them in the planning of territorial development.
Recently, it became clear that the directions of innovation in tourism are increasingly becoming a systemic nature, when tourism turns from the industry into a "public enterprise";, which involves a variety of institutional stakeholders: government, business, local communities, science and education.
At the same time, the remarkable thing is that the more the system of tourism management varies from industrial to post-industrial, the greater the innovative potential has the sphere of tourism, the greater the extent of tourism shifts from mass to individualized. This is due to the smaller segmentation of the market and the emergence of many niche, specialized services and tourist products. There is adaptation of tourism infrastructure, buildings and equipment for the needs of such new, growing groups of tourists as children, the elderly and the disabled.
The innovations in the tourism industry, according to Novikov V.S., “are the result of actions aimed at creating a new or changing existing tourist product, developing new markets, using advanced information and telecommunication technologies, improving the provision of tourist, transport and hotel services, creating strategic alliances for realization of tourist business, introduction of modern forms of organizational and managerial activity of tourist enterprises”.
In general, tourism is a multi-vector industry, which can create some difficulties in introducing innovations. At the same time, certain areas of tourism activity are impossible without the use of innovative technologies, in particular, information and computer technologies. Effective administrative work of tourism enterprises involves the application of various facilities, as Ukrainian travel agencies are widely using the information sector, in the form of messages, and the virtual sector of travel in global networks. Studies conducted in the field of tourism demonstrate the "consumer nature" of information innovation, while tourism is not a producer in this field. According to preliminary estimates, the cost of the initiative tour operators in Ukraine for maintaining an on-line booking system is about 2% of the cost of services sold. Sales of entertainment and recreation tours provide about 3.3 million dollars. US annually spent money on developing, maintaining and filling in the information support system. Common directions of the use of innovative technologies in tourism are: mobile Internet, catalogs of electronic offers, on-line booking not only for retail agencies, but also directly for clients. Further development of innovation activity is the development of new ideas for promotion of tourist product, development of new tourist routes, availability of information to the consumer, software, etc.
Evaluation of Innovative Technologies in Conditions of the Digital Economics
