Corporate Travel’s Fear of Failure and 5 Other Digital Trends This Week

Throughout the week we post dozens of original stories, connecting the dots across the travel industry, and every weekend we sum it all up. This weekend roundup examines digital trends.

For all of our weekend roundups, go here.

>>It blows our minds that corporate travel executives say the same exact thing at this conference every year. It's like Groundhog Day with more suits and fewer laughs. Everyone wants to be one step ahead, but where is the incentive to actually take that step? Corporate Travel’s Fear of Failure Dims Innovation

>>CEO Sean Menke has gained breathing room to provide positive surprises. Getting cloud-based distribution and operations software right is hard. So the company is relying on concepts from top-tier management consulting firms as guidance: Sabre’s Back to the Basics Strategy Shift Starts to Bear Fruit

>>No word yet on what activist hedge fund investor Paul Singer of Elliott Management might try to pressure Travelport do this year. But research analysts expect that, at the very least, the travel technology company will be pressed to spin off its fast-growing eNett payments business: Travelport Lost Lucrative Flight Centre Contract to Distribution Rivals

>>Corporate travel managers want to learn and improve what they do. It can be hard to take the risk of trying something new that doesn't work out, though, particularly when cost savings alone can seem like success: An Industry in Search of Innovation

>>Metasearch is hard, and comparison-shopping for vacation rentals and apartment shares is even harder. Tripping and others are having a hard time building their brands in the face of competition from larger players with more ample resources: Vacation Rental Search Site Tripping Lays Off 15 Employees and Restructures

>>With a successful Forum in Berlin behind us, we’re excited about the future and the rapidly approaching inaugural Skift Tech Forum this June: There Are Only 6 Weeks Until Skift Tech Forum in Silicon Valley