5G is set to help reshape the travel and hospitality industry, equipping businesses and consumers with the fastest and most responsive digital connectivity that will impact both guest engagement and hotel operations.
Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg believes the metaverse will one day supplant the mobile internet, and create the sense that you are actually together with someone else in a distant place. Whatever it ever ends up meaning to the travel industry, you can be sure it would develop into an advertising opportunity for the social network.
Private equity flooded the travel industry during the pandemic, but many startups looked to the government’s Innovate UK arm, which continues to put millions of pounds on the table.
The pandemic has sped up airline testing of virtual reality, augmented reality, and other technologies to train workforces more cost-effectively. Expect a few travel companies to join KLM in having "extended reality" IT teams by 2025.
Augmented reality will remain a seldom-used novelty for at least five years. But brands ignore the tech at their peril. Innovative travel companies may find chances today for cost-effective ad campaigns via the emerging medium.
Business travel is often dreaded by perpetual road warriors, but that’s not true for Valentina Frassi. Except when there's a pandemic, Frassi travels the world recording iconic scenes of major landmarks that most people can only dream of seeing.
Virtual reality has been the next big thing for years, and it always will be. But despite skepticism, the technology shows a potential to help the travel sector in a few specific, high margin cases.
With borders shut and hotels closed during the coronavirus pandemic, this could be the moment for remote training — and virtual reality’s role — in hospitality to shine and take off.