Robert K. Franklin, VisitBritain’s Executive Vice President for The Americas, has left his post in New York to become Executive Director of the European Travel Commission, based in Brussels. He will assume his new duties at the beginning of July 2004.

Mr Franklin, in his capacity as Chairman of ETC’s Operations Group in the USA, has already been actively involved for several years in the joint promotion of US travel to Europe by ETC’s members, 33 European national tourist organizations.

He has been with VisitBritain and its predecessor, the British Tourist Authority, for 35 years, and has been responsible for the organisation’s operations in the USA, Canada and Latin America since May 1999. Prior to his current appointment, Mr Franklin headed the Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa region, based in Singapore, and had previously held key positions in several VisitBritain offices worldwide including Sao Paulo, Dallas, Oslo, Madrid and New York.

Educated in Britain, Franklin was born and raised in Latin America. In addition to English, he is fluent in Spanish, Portuguese and French. He began his career with VisitBritain as a graduate trainee after obtaining an Honours degree in Modern Languages from Bristol University, England. More recently he was awarded the Order of the British Empire by the Queen in the annual birthday honours list.

Announcing the appointment, Arthur Oberascher, President of the European Travel Commission and Chief Executive Officer of the Austrian National Tourist Office said, “Rob is a strong addition to a strong team that will work to realise our vision of transforming the ETC into the platform for the success of European tourism. This includes overseeing the development of the new European tourism portal and implementing our new strategy emphasising the provision of e-services, market intelligence and organisational know-how to our 33 member NTOs.”

A Photo of Rob Franklin is available on request.

CONTACT: Lisa DAVIES - ETC Executive Unit, Brussels.

Tel.: 00 32 2 - 502 01 13 / Fax : 00 32 2 - 514 18 43

e-mail : press@etc-corporate.org / web: www.etc-corporate.org

NOTE: This Press Release is also available in French.

Both English & French versions can be found on the ETC website www.etc-corporate.org

under the section ‘Press’ - ‘current press releases’.