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There has been so much coverage of generative AI at Skift over the last several months that it may have been hard to catch it all. 

A UK-based startup has secured funding and two leading advisors to help its mission evolve how companies bring their teams together.

A 2014 Skift Research report projected that “silent travelers,” namely younger consumers who turned to their mobile devices first to obtain solutions to problems, would upend the travel industry.

Google advertising, search and other revenue revenue grew 2 percent year over year in the first quarter, pushed upwards by increases in revenue from travel and retail ads.

Skift Research believes that generative Artificial Intelligence represents a $28 billion-plus opportunity for the travel industry. It stands to change the way that we search for travel, how companies provide customer service, and could drive operational efficiencies across the industry.

Travel booking company eDreams Odigeo is testing Google’s generative AI capabilities on its online platforms, the companies said Thursday. 

Expedia Group CEO Peter Kern, who’s been working on revamping the company since April 2020, said “it would’ve been impossible for the old us, three years ago,” to have been nimble enough to be among the first movers in generative AI among online travel companies.

In a move to prioritize resources, Google Travel eliminated the feature that enabled Gmail users to view their past and upcoming trips, including everything from accommodations reservations to flights and things to do bookings, on google.com/travel.

Google announced on Wednesday several features powered by generative AI, including a few relevant to the travel sector. The news was shared at Google I/O, the company’s annual developer conference, presented by Google CEO Sundar Pichai and other company executives.

Tourism boards are preparing for a major update to Google Analytics. With the update, they would get deeper and streamlined insights into how visitors interact with their web content.

Good morning from Skift. It’s Friday, May 12. Here’s what you need to know about the business of travel today.

For developers, generative artificial intelligence will “allow our devs to kind of be super devs.” For consumers, it “can level the playing field from a service perspective.”

Priceline is implementing generative AI from Google Cloud in several areas of its business. 

Accurately measuring the climate impact of individual flights has been a thorny issue because the science is inexact. For example, Google Flights last year controversially dropped the inclusion of contrails, the streaking ice clouds that trap heat as they trail aircraft in the sky. They don’t contain CO2, but are believed to have a large effect on a flight’s contribution to global warming.

You see it everyday on hotel price comparison platforms such as Google: There’s the hotel’s official price on its website, and in swoops Singapore-based online travel agency Agoda with a lower rate, that’s $20 or $30 lower.

As we have written about in our deep dive on “Hopper’s Rise in Travel,” much of the company’s growth can be attributed to its expansion into fintech products, which has not only helped boost take rates and revenue gains, but has also allowed Hopper to be differentiated from the legacy players. Another way Hopper is distinct is its unique strategy around marketing and user acquisition – namely, how it avoids spending marketing dollars on Search Engine Marketing and instead focuses on product-led growth.

In the past week, the European Commission has issued two separate statements of objections to Google and Booking Holdings over antitrust concerns.

Tripadvisor is currently attempting a turnaround under a new CEO hired in 2022, and one of the reasons it needs one is Google had used its market power to divert users to sponsored ads and take back the free traffic Tripadvisor benefited from.

Travel agents using Sabre’s desktop software have begun receiving carbon emission data when they search for flights, and corporations that use the company’s booking tool for road warriors, GetThere, will get access later this year.

Online travel is a weird industry when it comes to its outsized marketing spend as compared with other types of businesses.

Booking.com is rolling out an AI Trip Planner to U.S. members of its Genius travel rewards program on its mobile app starting Wednesday, the company announced.