Two trends stand out from InterContinental Hotels Group’s annual trends report, released this week at the World Economic Forum in Davos. The report ‘The Uncompromising Customer: Addressing the Paradoxes of the Age of I’ looks at the conflicting situations consumers find themselves in and which impact their purchasing decisions….
Airbnb ended 2016 ahead of Booking.com for the first time in visitor numbers on US travel websites, although Expedia remains ahead of both. Data released by audience tracking service SimilarWeb saw the home sharing service reach 87.8 million visits in the last quarter of the year. This was 5.5 million…
2016 was the year of ‘the loyalty wars’, the battle of the century between online travel agencies and hotel brands. NB: This is a viewpoint from Peter O’Connor, professor of information systems at Essec Business School in Paris, and European online analyst for Phocuswright. Hilton, Marriott, Accor Hotels and…
Those organising travel services on behalf of major corporations still consider mobile as the biggest challenge to them and the industry. A survey of 150 leading travel buyers for the Travel Technology Europe trade show found that mobile is the technology that “excites” them the most, ahead of the…
Accommodation service BudgetPlaces has ended almost 14 years as an independent company and sold to travel group eDreams Odigeo. Terms of the deal have not been disclosed. eDreams Odigeo says the deal will not any impact on 2016-2017 capital expenditures as it follows the sale of part of its corporate travel…
Huge investment sum to the tune of $50 million going into Upside – on the day Jay Walker officially unveils the site. The startup (TLabs here from June 2016) has been in beta testing for months but used today’s launch to disclose that it has raised the money from a…
The number of trip planning websites is nowhere near as high as it once was, as many a startup has tried and failed to get traction to survive. One of those that has stayed the course is TripHobo, which this week has shared a raft of data about what it…
The travel industry has always been in the inspiration business. Ours is an industry that leverages curiosity and realises experiences which bring us together and open the world. NB: This is a viewpoint by Hugo Burge, CEO of Momondo Group. But for all of the wider social and economic…
If 2016 was the year in which the early adopting airlines completed their roll-outs of wifi, then 2017 will be when others starting catching up. That’s perhaps the top-line finding from an annual State Of The Nation-type report from RouteHappy to illustrate the provision of wifi capability on carriers around…
French car firm Renault has bought Karhoo, the taxi metasearch app which went into administration late last year. The deal has been carried out by Renault’s wholly owned bank RCI, which has bought a majority stake in Flit Technologies, the business which acquired the assets of Karhoo from the…