2017 › August

This week in digital news we talked about chatbots and artificial intelligence, specifically that they're finally having a noticeable impact on meetings and events.

This week in hospitality, our biggest story is 11,000 words on Airbnb's net worth and the process of going public. In the background, hotels are still having a tug-of-war with online travel agencies.

This week in aviation, our big story is about Norwegian Air bucking the trend. For once, an airline that passengers genuinely love, but that affection may not fix their falling profits.

With several other restaurant-facing product offerings, Eat24 was the one that didn't fit into the Yelp puzzle. By ceding delivery to former rival, Grubhub, Yelp is free to focus on the other parts of its business that certainly benefit from its robust consumer network.

Skyscanner had been sniffing around Brazil's homegrown metasearch leader Mundi and checking its books. Kayak appears to have swooped in to shore up market share.

Expect Hyatt to delve even deeper into more of those adjacent spaces going forward.

TripAdvisor has expanded its food delivery service outside the U.S. and Canada, part of its strategy to grow non-hotel revenues. More travelers can chow on crisp-fried shrimp paste chicken comfortably in their rooms. Hotels have no choice but to say bon appetit.

Vayant is a tech vendor that has never caught the imaginations and wallets of travel companies to the same degree as a few of its peers have. This has all the attributes of a soft landing.

Who's looking to buy up some European vacation rental businesses? Our money's on AccorHotels, Airbnb, and HomeAway, among others.

We like to think of this as Hyatt's payback for AccorHotels stealing away onefinestay last year.