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Data Snaps - Are Tech Titans breaking through or steadily moving in?

May 23, 2019
Kristina S.Park

It’s a big week for industry disruptors and I’m talking tech titans and the almighty artificial intelligence (AI). As mentioned in our Data Snaps from earlier this month, tech titans have been making their ways into the hospitality industry, and it’s clear from this week’s happenings that they’re already here. Read on to see what Amazon and Google are up to, which AI trends to watch out for, and how hospitality technology is changing to keep up with the pace.

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Alexa, book me a flight to New Delhi. Okay, maybe we’re not there yet, but Amazon has now added flights to its long list of services. According to Skift’s article, Amazon has partnered with India-based OTA Cleartrip to offer domestic flights within India to its platform. While it might be seen as a baby step into the industry by some, it’s still a major move by a big technology player. After their 2014 attempt to enter the hotel industry, Amazon put a halt on the plan until now. Starting with airlines, and depending on how it goes, it appears that Amazon is back again and entering the hospitality industry with another approach. Meanwhile, Google has been busy making moves behind the scenes with an approach that we can’t help but applaud. We’ve mentioned time and time again that integrations are the key to connecting the hotel technology industry, which is famously lagging behind other well-integrated industries. We believe in integrating the industry so much that we prioritize offering the most integrations possible in the industry through our SnapShot Analytics solutions (45+ integrations and counting!) Leading tech giant Google is well aware of the importance of integrations and has just announced its latest integration with IBC Hospitality Technologies, according to this article. Through this partnership, IBC clients will have access to Google Hotel Search users and increase the number of their direct bookings. Sounds like a win-win integration, which we couldn’t be more encouraging about.

Stay connected in the cloud

We’re not the only ones who are preaching the value of integrations. As seen here, integrations also help elevate your hotel business to the next level. Legacy systems can only offer a small fraction of t

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he benefits of a cloud-based PMS, and this is due to the flexibility and connectivity of partnerships between various hotel technology systems in most cloud PMS. These new and improved PMS allow hotels to use technology systems they are accustomed to in an all-in-one solution, if they are connected to one another. Once interconnectivity is up and running throughout a hotel, operations improve drastically, which in turn, increases revenue. Anyone out there who still doesn’t believe in the power of integrations? I didn’t think so.


AI door

Last, but definitely not least, there is the matter of artificial intelligence and how it’s already changing and will continue to change the hospitality industry. According to this Skift video, there are three major trends to watch out for: The Goldilocks Opportunity, The Netflix Effect, and Travel-as-a-Service. With these three trends, AI will impact the “middle” range of price points of the industry and offer more personalized and justified prices, increase the power of customer data and encourage even more data collection (yay!), and introduce AI-powered travel agents to maximize on guest preferences. If that’s not enough for you, AI is also changing the business travel scene too. As seen here, business travel tools aren’t as developed as consumer focused ones, and AI is about to change that. Using AI-powered technology, business travel platforms can learn traveler preferences and detect repeat travel patterns. Not only that, but AI can also assist business travelers who are already on their trip and make their experiences even more personalized and convenient. Like I said, it’s a big week for the hospitality technology industry and it’s only going to get more and more exciting. Stay tuned!