Resort Hotel and ‘Ryokan’ Operator Relo Vacations Adopts Platio to Digitize Equipment Inspection Process at About 70 Facilities in Japan

Press Release

Tokyo — June 30, 2023 — Asteria Corporation (Japan listed, Security Code: 3853) announced today that Tokyo-based Relo Vacations, Ltd., which operates the membership resort business and the hotel and ryokan (traditional Japanese inn) management business, has adopted no-code^*1 mobile app building tool “Platio” to replace paper-based reporting of daily equipment inspection results to digital reporting using a smartphone app. The new system has helped reduce about 1,000 person-hours a year and saved 70,000 or so sheets of paper, according to the company.

Background and Impact

Relo Vacations runs about 70 lodging facilities across Japan, including membership resort hotel brand Point Vacation and hotel and ryokan brands Yutorelo and Fuga. To ensure that guests can use facilities safely and comfortably, staff members inspect more than 150 items on the checklist every day to maintain the quality and safety of facilities and ensure thorough food hygiene management.

Before the introduction of Platio, staff members at each facility would handwrite the results of daily inspections on a paper report and type such data into monthly reports created on a computer after receiving the seal of approval from managers. The monthly reports were handed in to the administration department in a PDF file, which would then be checked visually to keep track of the current inspection status of all facilities and detect possible problems. The manual workflow led to increased workload on both field and administration staff members.

Thus, Relo Vacations focused on Platio, which allows administration staff members to create mobile apps even if they have no experience with it, and enables flexible editing of inspection items on the app. Changes made to the app will be reflected immediately. The product was introduced at about 70 Relo Vacations lodging facilities and villas nationwide.

Administration staff members with no experience in app creation built “Equipment Inspection App” in about 90 minutes and distributed to field staff members. About 100 staff members at each facility complete reporting to the department by simply entering the results of equipment inspections into the app on their smartphones.

High priority reports are shared with the administration department in a timely manner using push notification, resulting in a significant improvement in the efficiency of inspection work. In total, field staff members and administration staff members have saved about 1,000 person-hours a year and eliminated 70,000 or so sheets of paper usage per year.

Furthermore, Platio’s ability to quickly edit an app without coding means that the administration department actively incorporates suggestions for improvement to the functionality and usability of the app from field staff members. Such improvements are being made on a daily basis. Since Platio was introduced, Relo Vacations facilities have digitized business operations one after another. Based on accurate feedback from each facility, they also created “Public Bath Management App” to keep the bathroom inspection and cleaning records. The digitization of reporting with an app made it easier for the administration department to keep track of the operations of the facilities and accelerate followups. In the future, Relo Vacations plans to analyze a wide variety of data accumulated through the app to come up with ideas for improvement of business operations.

In post-pandemic era, Asteria intends to contribute to digital transformation (DX) in the tourism and lodging industries, where businesses are resuming full operations, and meet the rapidly growing demand from domestic travel demand and revenge spending.

＜Examples of Platio apps created by Relo Vacations administration staff members＞

Name of app	Usage
Equipment inspection App	Check cleaning status and the operation of emergency stop button, as well as share a monthly disaster prevention report
Public Bath Management App	Record bathroom inspection and cleaning, control water temperature and keep tabs on when the operations of tanks were checked

Message from Relo Vacations

*A mechanism which allows creation of software and apps without writing a single line of code. Platio users can deploy necessary functions and modify app’s specifications to make it more serviceable at worksites, even if they do not have expertise in a programming language.

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About Relo Vacations, Ltd.

Relo Vacations runs the membership resort, hotel and inn management, hotel revitalization and consulting businesses with the aim of providing travel experiences that enrich people as well as local communities and brighten up their life.

For more information, visit https://relovacations.com/ (in Japanese only)

About Asteria Corporation

Established in 1998, Asteria developed its first no-code product in 2002. It sells software and services which connect a variety of in-house computers and devices. Its key product, ASTERIA Warp, is middleware which integrates data in different computer systems without coding. As of end-March 2023, 9,931 companies, mainly large and medium ones, had introduced the product. Another product, Handbook, allows users to carry around materials used for sales activities and meetings as well as product catalogues in electronic files on smartphones and tablets. A total of 1,680 companies and public institutions had adopted the product through end-March 2023.

For more information, visit https://en.asteria.com/

About Platio

Platio is a cloud service which allows users to easily create and use mobile apps that fit specific tasks without coding. Platio promotes digitalization at worksites and improves efficiency of manual processes, thereby facilitating digital transformation (DX) of on-site operations. It offers over 100 templates with which workers who have no programming skills can create a business app. Data that users entered into an app is stored in the cloud and will be shared real time the up-to-date status of worksites with managers. Apps also can automatically detect changes in entered data and send an alert to managers so that they can quickly respond to anomalies. Apps for businesses tend to be complex and expensive. As an easy app building solution, Platio won Good Design Award for fiscal 2018. In 2022, Asteria launched “Platio Connect,” which enables not only app creation and utilization, but also data integration without coding. This tool supports data utilization by seamlessly linking on-site data with systems and services.

For more information, visit https://plat.io/

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Asteria, Handbook and Platio are registered trademarks of Asteria Corporation.
The names of products are registered trademarks or trademarks of individual companies.