Hotel technology tips

CIC Hospitality is opening 30 boutique Aiden by Best Western hotels in Scandinavia, but they won’t come with staff in the flesh and blood standing at the front desk. 

Adam Harris, the CEO of hotel management software company Cloudbeds, has a great no-nonsense grasp of the macro – and micro – environment in the startup fundraising world, a fact that I learned in a few back and forth LinkedIn messages and subsequent calls between us gossiping about the travel tech startups that were raising money or got sold for pennies on the dollar in the last few months.

The hotel industry finally wants to modernize the tech systems it uses to operate. And Oracle Hospitality — which has sold much of the older tech that’s still being used today — is focused on making that shift happen. 

Yanolja Cloud has acquired Innsoft, an Oregon-based provider of hotel management software, for $8.3 million.  

Tyler Morse, Chairman and CEO of MCR Hotels, revealed that his company had acquired about 70 hotels and two software companies during the pandemic when he spoke at the Skift Future of Lodging Forum.

Over the past decades, the booking pendulum has swung back and forth between online travel agents’ (OTAs) growing booking share, and hotels clawing back some direct bookings. Hoteliers have been complaining about high commissions paid to third-party travel websites, and increasingly invest in driving more direct bookings. The evolving hotel tech stack has website builders, booking engines, and direct-booking tools offering to aid this cause.

When Hilton contracted third-party tech company HotelKey to provide the property management system for all 7,000 of its hotels, it made the choice because that’s what executives thought would be best for the company.

Guests have an abundance of channels to choose from when making a hotel reservation. Companies finding the optimal mix in this vast channel landscape is the goal of any good hotel distribution strategy. As the number of booking options multiply, it only makes fighting off the competition more complex. Most large hotel chains use Central Reservation Systems (CRSs) to have a central source for all hotel reservations, and to tackle reservation-related challenges.

Skift Research’s U.S. Travel Tracker Survey shows that online sources are used more than offline sources when planning a trip, making digital marketing and advertising crucial for the industry. If a brand is marketed well, potential customers will be drawn to it regardless of how they decide to book their trip.

Accor held a day of presentations for investors on June 27, and I wrote a piece covering 7 top slides from it. Today I want to highlight the most notable 20 minutes of the six hours of talks.

It is generally acknowledged by hospitality professionals that the industry is far behind technologically. In a world where consumers are spoiled by high-tech service in banking and retail, hotels often leave guests feeling unsatisfied.

Three travel tech startups have announced more than $4 million in funding this week.

The Standard has announced the return of its last minute booking app, One Night Standard.