Sean O'Neill

With this deal, Wex now becomes a powerhouse in assisting business-to-business travel payments worldwide. The deal also gives cash to seller Travelport, which might use the money to expand its airline tech offerings.

A few startups receiving funding this week deserve props for trying to shake up travel. Life House is targeting a brand gap left by major hotel groups in some markets. ByHours raised funding for letting guests book stays of as little as three hours at partner hotels. Stasher offers a network of rentable storage spaces for travelers' bags.

Accor recently rebranded its loyalty program under the phrase "Live Limitless." The company needs to replace its limited technology structure to meet that ambition, and this deal represents a huge commercial win for Sabre.

Oracle Hospitality's Alex Alt sees two gaps in his company's suite: distribution services and customer relationship management tools. Yet the opportunities with both are dynamic, not static, because of fast shifts in hotel company priorities and traveler behaviors. That will require Alt to be one very adaptable executive.

This week, travel startups announced more than $100 million in funding. One company to call out is Xiezhu. It provides software and hardware to about 8,000 hotels in China. We expect broad growth in the "smart hotels" trend, which involves devices such as electronic door locks for guest rooms that can be opened by voice or facial recognition.

To call a company the best-capitalized hotel tech startup might seem like pointing out the tallest leprechaun. But while SiteMinder serves only about 36,000 hotels out of a million worldwide, new funding from cash-rich investor BlackRock could fuel the hotel connectivity startup's growth substantially.

Despegar doesn't follow the same playbook as the global online travel players. Charting its own path has worked for the Latin American agency. Expect Despegar to make a strategic acquisition this year to support its heady plans for growth.

This week, travel startups DAQ Soft, The Guild, Shep, Hellotickets, Bob, Beonprice, Whizar, IceLolly, and Your Rentals raised funding. It's great that angel investors continue to support early-stage companies.

Most corporate travelers would rather think about anything else than booking and expensing travel. That's why companies are scrambling to help reduce that pain point for road warriors. We expect Coupa, Certify, Chrome River, and SAP Concur to acquire more travel tech companies to help seize the opportunity.

The travel industry has at least 10 young private companies that have each raised more than $500 million so far while continuing to seek an exit for their investors. That's a remarkable boom in travel startups compared with a decade ago.