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Staying Ahead of the Next Hospitality Technology Disruption

Mar 2017/in , /by

It was 2008 when Airbnb caused an industry-wide double take. Suddenly, technology was disrupting how and where people were booking hotels. Hotel companies navigated the change – by targeting business travelers, redesigning loyalty programs, and, for some, partnering with Airbnb. In a true “if you can’t beat them, join them” move, small hotels list their rooms on Airbnb for a lower reservation fee than traditional hotel listing services. In return, some hotels provide check-in services and amenities for certain Airbnb properties. Now, hospitality companies aren’t taking any chances that technology could disrupt practices beyond bookings. To avoid being surprised again, hospitality companies are incorporating technology on their own and in response to “nearly two-thirds of U.S. guests stating it was “very or extremely important” for hotels to continue investing in technology to enhance the guest experience.” These hospitality technologies range through the top tech trends of the moment.

Not unlike Airbnb, hotel companies are discovering the advantages of a new, mobile-first society, as depicted in StayNTouch’s ebook, How Mobile Technology Will Generate More Revenue for Your Hotel. Many hotel companies apply a hospitality technology, cloud Property Management Systems (PMS) solutions, to automatically offer room upgrades, promote amenities, and provide greater services like early and late check in and out options. This same solution can gather customer knowledge in real-time on arrival time and guest preferences to best manage housekeeping and customer service. The interconnected processes ultimately improve room turnover along with brand loyalty.

Woman wearing an Ocean Medallion wearable hospitality technologyHospitality Technology image from Cruise Critic

Let’s look at three transformative technologies that the hospitality industry is jumping on: wearables, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence.

1. Wearable Technology Cruising

Following top tech trends, hospitality companies are introducing wearable technology into their offerings. Most commonly, these high technology hospitality companies turn to smart watches that can deliver dynamic guest details in real-time including dining preferences, food allergies, and spending histories. Royal Caribbean Cruises offers smartbands on certain high-end ships that act as room keys, wireless payment methods, and tickets. In response, Carnival Cruises introduced a credit card-connected Ocean Medallion, able to be worn in multiple ways including like a watch as pictured above, that will offer similar capabilities to Royal’s watches but will also power a future, ship-wide gambling platform. The hospitality technology that is the Ocean Medallion utilizes an IoT network of sensors and computing devices along with NFC and Bluetooth communication capabilities throughout the ships and ports. The Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management stated that, “wearable devices will transform consumers from tourists to explorers.” From the company side, wearable devices provide data and access to customers that enhance offerings to stay competitive in new ways.

“Leading hotel companies are … lever­aging advances in data analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to increase online reservations, im­prove the return on advertising spend (ROAS), better understand guest pref­erences, and build stronger customer relationships,” according to global analyst firm EY

2. Artificial Intelligence Assistance

In terms of artificial intelligence, Ivy from Go Moment is an IBM Watson-driven system designed to handle guest requests. The cognitive technology can interpret questions to fulfill requests and converse with you by phone. Other AIs take a more dramatic, tangible form in robots. Also powered by IBM Watson, Hilton introduced Connie the concierge in one of their Virginia hotels last year. Connie informs guests on local attractions, hotel features, amenities, and can make recommendations for dining and activities.

3. Virtual Reality Hotel Experience

77% of U.S. consumers are interested in virtual reality (VR) equipment right now, as reported by the Consumer Technology Association. The hotel industry is quickly taking this into account and working to incorporate VR as a hospitality technology. Marriot Hotels & Resorts collaborated with Samsung in 2015 for a virtual reality hotel room experience offering titled VRoom Service that received a headset and headphones. Best Western Hotels & Resorts leveraged a VR experience that allows guests to immerse themselves in the hotels before their stay.

 

Ultimately, these heightened experiences through technology enable hospitality companies to charge higher prices, create up-sell opportunities at each point of the customers’ journey, and stay ahead of the next potential disruption, all the while delighting their customers.

This blog is part of an Industry & Market Series –  analyzing what FirstRain users are tracking at the moment in order to gain advantage for the moment.

Bubble View

It’s not a bubble really – and the rockstars agree

Aug 2011/in , , /by

Living in Silicon Valley, running a software company with big ambitions I hear the question a lot. Is this another tech bubble? Isn’t is going to burst again?

The short answer is no.

Pundits covering tech tend to confuse valuation with long term value. We may well be in a valuation bubble but unlike the 2000 tech bubble the companies in question have deep, sustainable revenue models.

There are certainly some high valuations – per Fred Wilson’s view of frothy valuations in April – and these are driven by investor demand. As Father Guido Sarducci so wisely said in the 5 minute university, Economics is about supply and demand. When a few companies have sky high valuations in the public and private markets VCs are chasing good ideas with too much money again and so the early stage and later stage valuations may be getting silly for most companies, but some will be worth it.

Valuation is very different than long term value. Technology, and in particular software, is where long term sustainable value is being built. And when I say long term I am thinking hundreds of years. Marc Andreesen wrote very eloquently about this in the WSJ on Saturday in his essay Why Software Is Eating the World. We are at the beginning of a long era in which technology will reshape every aspect of our lives in ways we are just now beginning to see.

Just as the Industrial Revolution developed over more than 150 years in the 18th and 19th centuries and reshaped machines, industry, transport and the very nature of where people chose to live and work, technology is now reshaping the way we communicate, are entertained, where we live and work and shop and it is rewiring our kids brains for a new world. I’ve believed this for 20 years and the ups and downs of the tech world over that period have done nothing to dissuade me from that belief because technology is steadily, consistently and dramatically changing our lives. (Want to get some perspective on the 150 year change last time around – spend a day in Ironbridge in Shropshire, England.)

It’s happening right now because the pieces are now in place. As Marc writes “Six decades into the computer revolution, four decades since the invention of the microprocessor, and two decades into the rise of the modern Internet, all of the technology required to transform industries through software finally works and can be widely delivered at global scale.”

The cost structure is right, the technology base is ready. In FirstRain’s case we have built a highly disruptive technology that changes the way business people use the web for their critical decision making. As Roger McNamee says in his thought provoking talk “Everything is Changing”, Google’s approach to indexing has peaked. People want apps designed for their specific need (he cites his investments like Facebook and Yelp), not one app for all needs, and they want it on their device of choice – which is a smartphone or an iPad. In our case the business need is even more specific than that. Our users want a business web app so they can tap into the breadth, currency and power of the web as a data source, but they want it tailored to their specific business and role, and they want it in a cost effective way.

Marc and Roger are just two rockstars in Silicon Valley but most people here agree with them (and not just because we are all drinking the same Kool-Aid). Yes we are dealing with some higher valuations, maybe that is a bubble, but the long term value being built in technology is real, and software is where it’s at. And what makes it even better is it a continuously exciting place to build a career, or even a company.

chess-769050_960_720

Software is King and the source of growth in 2011 Silicon Valley

Feb 2011/in /by

Every recession, every major generation of the Valley, naysayers come out and say the good days are over – but Silicon Valley continues to reinvent itself.

The latest herald of doom is Scott McNealy, former CEO of Sun. In a Business Insider interview Scott claims that Silicon Valley’s emerging sectors, like social networking and “green” technology, will not make up for jobs lost due to the software and computer industry consolidation. But with big names like Google, Microsoft, and Facebook planning for expansion, I wouldn’t be so quick to assume it’s all over.

Claiming that every new transition creates less job opportunity than before, Scott lacks confidence in the future potential of contemporary partnerships to flourish. But he’s wrong. Not only is it anticipated that social networking industries will more than make up for lost jobs, but we are likely to see unprecedented growth in the consolidation of software and hardware companies. The technology sector never fails to impress me with new innovation and change, and this “recession” is no exception.

Even Obama sees it (although maybe he is here fund raising at the same time). He says that our tech companies are the heirs to the industries that made the United States the worlds biggest economy. He is in the Bay Area today to discuss job creation and innovation around the Silicon Valley with executives like Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Eric Schmidt, and many more.

Maybe the irony is stinging. Facebook announced last week that it will in fact move its corporate headquarters to Sun’s old facility in Menlo Park (Sun having been swallowed by the Oracle whale). This is Facebook’s second move in the last two years and they have now leased a 1-million-square-foot campus. Google has announced a big addition as well, introducing a new campus in San Francisco to help alleviate long commutes. Google has also experienced a record 75,000 job applications over the last week, and they expect to grow more than 30,000 employees by 2012 (Dow Jones).

It is software technology that is driving this growth. Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, claims that more than 300,000 Android devices are being activated everyday, requiring more engineers and sales people to keep up with the high demand. “This will be our biggest hiring year ever,” said Jordan Newman (a Google company spokesman). Note — FirstRain is currently hiring in California and India.

Growth Industries:

Sadly I think Nokia is trying to get back to growth by partnering with Microsoft for their phone OS but my personal opinion is they just killed what was once a great phone provider. Microsoft may gain – they are trying to make the new Windows Phone 7 a success – and they are hooking up with Nokia’s strong hardware but I doubt the combination will compete. But they are not the only ones focusing on Valley software innovation. Their old competitor, Sony Ericsson, is shifting resources from its headquarters in Sweden to Silicon Valley in order to keep up with the shifting increase from hardware to software demands in the mobile phone industry.


I think Scott is just plain wrong, or certainly colored by his predominantly hardware background. He believes that Silicon Valley is “not the best place in the world to start a company,” but the evidence in the software world is to the contrary. Maybe it’s just his personal preference, but as Senator Mark Warner of Virginia correctly claims, the Internet and social networking have been “one of the rare areas of growth in the U.S. economy” in a decade that didn’t spur much innovation.

As for “green” technology not being able to make up for lost jobs that is certainly true in the short term, as it typically takes a full generation for a new industry to take effect. However, the key to the Silicon Valley economy is now software innovation, and we’re excited to be a part of it.

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