Payment Innovations Pave Way for Future in Travel Plus 6 Other Top Digital Stories This Week

Travel Megatrends 2020: Travel Payments Find Path to Painless: Global payments technology and rules are changing swiftly, led by seamless innovations in Asia that are making life easier for consumers. Travel companies of all sizes are finally taking action in order to stay competitive.

Airbnb Taps a Former Disney Theme Park Exec to Run Its Experiences Business: Experiences could become a big business for Airbnb, but a cautionary note is that competition from venture-backed companies is heating up. The sector leader, Tripadvisor, just took a step back to reboot its experiences strategy while laying off employees.

What the Sabre-Farelogix Antitrust Trial Could Reveal About Airline Technology: It’s notable that we had a much easier time finding experts who supported Sabre’s proposed merger of Farelogix than opponents. But this court case will be decided on legal nuances, and its outcome is impossible to predict. We pity the judge who has to endure this crash course in airline technology and distribution.

Despegar Buys Mexican Travel Agency Best Day for $136 Million: At a stroke, Despegar will boost its annual revenue by about 25 percent. Acquiring Best Day Travel Group, one of the largest travel agencies in Mexico, will also solidify its set of products, including in the promising business-to-business segment.

How the Cloud Is Shaking Up Hotel Property Management Tech: New Skift Research: Technological advancements have allowed for new entrants into the property management systems space to offer a viable alternative to incumbent legacy systems. Those systems might be scrambling for now, but they’ll catch up. All this can only be a good thing for the PMS and hotel tech space in the long run.

Frontify Raises $22 Million for Digital Brand Management: Travel Startup Funding This Week: Frontify helps companies like Lufthansa keep their brand assets in order, while Upgrade Pack offers a subscription service for access to exclusive discounts on flight and hotel upgrades, plus other interesting startup ideas in this week’s funding roundup.

Regulatory Scrutiny of Online Travel Platforms Could Shed New Light on Business Practices: Online travel companies have faced intense regulatory scrutiny almost since the first days of internet bookings. But “you’ve got mail” these days is less likely to be a cheery email notification than a demand for court appearances and audits.