Innovation

🏨 Hotelogix, a cloud-based hospitality tech provider, launched an hourly booking module for hotels to offer flexible check-in/out and affordable stays. Hourly hotel bookings, valued at $16.67 billion in 2019, are expected to reach $25.62 billion by 2027. The trend is prominent in the US, UK, India, Philippines, and Southeast Asia, saving guests up to 60% on costs. Hotelogix's system includes custom reports for tracking hourly booking metrics. GCGC's adoption of the feature led to over 750 bookings, averaging 6 hours each, and a 40% revenue increase per room.

📌 Sloan Dean, CEO of Remington Hospitality, remarks on eased staffing challenges with wage growth cooling from 8% to 4% and turnover among hourly employees in housekeeping and food & beverage at 100%. Liv Wang from ADP Research highlights leisure & hospitality leading wage growth from 2021 to early this year, now returning to normal. Dean emphasizes hiring the right people, leveraging technology, and fostering a high culture environment to attract passionate individuals and improve efficiency, including the use of AI in HR and legal.

📍 InviAir's air diffusers utilize a proprietary composite material to absorb sound and minimize ambient noise. The material's low temperature response reduces condensation by up to 95%. Product information is available at inviair.com.

🚗 SoundHound AI Inc. at CES showcases a hands-on experience with Lucid's hands-free assistant integrated with SoundHound Chat AI for vehicle control via speech. This technology, live for Lucid Air owners, responds to "Hey Lucid" and understands natural language for queries on weather, sports, and more, without requiring a cellular connection. It offers enhanced functionality through over-the-air updates and supports English, Spanish, French, Arabic, German, and Dutch, with more languages to come.

🏩 Lou Zameryka discussed "The AI Revolution in Hospitality" on Jan. 7, 2025, focusing on how AI can help the hotel industry thrive.

🏨 Hotel Traveltine in Downtown Singapore implemented D-EDGE solutions for operational enhancement, including a user-friendly website integrated with its booking and channel management systems, performance-based digital marketing campaigns for increased traffic and bookings, and Global Distribution System (GDS) integration to access the business travel market.

📢 STAAH, a tech company serving hoteliers, released its top distribution channels list for the UK, Middle East, and Sri Lanka. In the UK, Booking.com, Expedia, and Pitchup.com led, with STAAH SwiftBook at number four. The Middle East saw Booking.com, Agoda, and Expedia top, with STAAH GDS climbing to fifth. Sri Lanka's leaders were Booking.com, Agoda, and Expedia. Notably, Trip.com and Hotelbeds emerged across regions, while Airbnb's ranking dropped. Direct bookings through hotel websites stayed strong in all regions, thanks to increased investment in booking engines and conversion tools. STAAH's channel manager network boasts over 500 integrations, and the company now offers access to over 2,000 distribution channels.