Dennis Schaal

Checked bag fees are stabilizing and travelers are getting waivers by using co-branded airline credit cards. As demand for business travel rises, change fees are almost generating as much revenue as bag fees, although change fees often fly under the radar.

Orbitz had a little momentum going, but saw its all-important hotel room-night growth slow in the first quarter. It is also a lesson in scale as the bigger players such as Expedia and Priceline grow much faster.

Lawsuits didn't kill hotel rate parity. Instead, it is Big Data, analytics, advertsiing retargeting and personalization that are making enforcement of rate-parity provisions almost untenable.

The gaming companies don't have the most beds, but they've managed to turn each one they have into a reliable cash register for their business.

Travelocity talked years ago about getting into the advertising and media business in a big way, but never made it happen. But, now Expedia has grand plans to use Travelocity's North America sites as a platform to expanding Expedia's own advertising and media business in tandem with the jolt that Trivago is already providing.

Trivago is the all-star in the Expedia stable, and saw its revenue rise year over year at an 80% clip in the first quarter of 2014.

Who's going to catch HomeAway? TripAdvisor is going to give it a try, as it acquired the smallish VacationHomeRentals.com to its portfolio, but unlike HomeAway, TripAdvisor has a lot of other irons in the fire.

Republic Airways freed itself of money-losing Frontier, and Republic recorded a nice profit in the first quarter despite massive flight cancellations.

Trippy is banking on the premise that its new question and answer platform for travel will be a cut above the rest in terms of quality, and that it will distinguish itself in the way it maps attractions and concisely summarises their basics for travel planning. That begs the question: Will it be enough?

With 1,000 customers signed up for its open-booking platform, and 5,000 new clients enrolled in all its products over the last year, Concur is getting increasingly mainstream in the corporate travel industry. That's a challenge for establishment companies such as American Express, Carlson Wagonlit Travel and BCD, which must pay heed to the insurgent.