Cinnamon Box Office (CBO) has launched an AI-powered Destination Event Calendar designed to transform how visitors and locals discover events, entertainment, culture and experiences across Sri Lanka, while strengthening Colombo’s proposition as a year-round destination for tourism, events and lifestyle experiences.

The Destination Event Calendar is part of Cinnamon Box Office, a ticketing and premium event experience platform designed to position Sri Lanka as a destination for world-class events, entertainment and lifestyle experiences. Its event proposition spans eight pillars: Concerts, MICE, Contemporary Music, Classic Music, Children, Food & Beverage, Speakers and Theatre, creating a broader events offering capable of attracting local, regional and international audiences.

The platform brings together audiences, event organisers, venues, hotels and partners through an integrated offering covering ticketing, event management, marketing, audience engagement and reporting. Cinnamon Box Office supports events from planning to performance through event consultation, online marketing, AI-powered social campaigns, ticket sales management, AI sales forecasting, D-Day ticket validation and QR entry, 24/7 hotline support and payment reconciliation.

The launch comes at a time when Colombo has significant untapped potential as a tourism and events destination. Colombo currently captures just 28% of Sri Lanka’s tourist arrivals, compared to a regional average of approximately 70%. Despite having the highest number of five-star hotels in the country, Colombo also has the lowest occupancy. With seasonality and dependence on winter markets continuing to influence tourism patterns, achieving three million arrivals will require Colombo to attract an estimated one million intra-regional tourists.

At the same time, Colombo is not yet widely associated with being a leading tourism city. According to the Brand Finance Global City Index 2024, Colombo ranks 84th globally. The opportunity is to strengthen the city’s destination identity by creating greater visibility around its cultural, entertainment and lifestyle experiences, supported by planned activity throughout the year.

“Colombo has the opportunity to add significant soft power to the city through events, museums, art galleries and festivals. What is important is to make these experiences more visible and accessible and to connect them with the visitor. Technology and AI now give us the ability to bring together what is happening across the city and the country and make it easier for people to discover. This is about creating more reasons to visit Sri Lanka and strengthening Colombo’s position as a destination,” said Dileep Mudadeniya, Senior Vice President – Global Alliances & Partnerships and Head of Corporate Affairs, John Keells Group.

The Destination Event Calendar provides an interactive guide to events and experiences taking place across Sri Lanka, with AI-driven data gathering creating a wide-ranging inventory covering major arena shows and international productions alongside local events, smaller venues and cultural experiences.

The platform is designed to capture the volume and diversity of events across Sri Lanka through hyper-local, automated data gathering from venue websites, social media platforms, ticketing APIs and venue-contributed information. This extends from major arenas to grassroots venues and community spaces, creating a single place to discover what is happening across the country. The event inventory can also be distributed through partner-ready widgets to digital partners, providing audiences with a comprehensive source for things to do.

Through dynamic, geo-located maps, personalised recommendations, event carousels and integrated event and artist information, users can discover events based on their location and interests, save preferences and receive relevant notifications.

For hotels and resorts, the Destination Event Calendar creates an interactive event concierge that enables guests to discover more of the local culture and experiences available during their stay. It also allows hotels to become local event experts by providing up-to-date information on events and experiences taking place nearby, with partner-ready widgets and refreshed listings available for integration with hotel and travel platforms.

For Sri Lanka, the opportunity is to build on the existing events ecosystem and make these experiences easier to discover, access and promote throughout the year. By connecting event organisers, venues, hotels, audiences and partners through a unified digital platform, the Destination Event Calendar is intended to create more reasons for visitors to explore local culture and experiences while giving the hospitality sector a stronger role in destination discovery.

The launch forms part of Cinnamon Box Office’s broader ambition to contribute to positioning Sri Lanka as South Asia’s leading hub for events, entertainment and lifestyle experiences.