MAY 17 - 31, 2006
TOP O' THE NEWS
- On-line bookings continue to rise, but travel agents still generate higher-revenue business
On-line bookings continue to rise steadily, according to TravelCLICK’s eMonitor results for the first quarter of 2006. Worldwide electronic hotel revenue booked through the Global Distribution Systems (GDS) and key Internet sites combined was up 12.9% over the same period last year. Room nights were up 7.6%, and ADR increased by 4.9%; the average length of stay was unchanged at 2.14 nights.
Interestingly, travel agents continued to provide significantly higher-revenue business for hotels, with an average rate 37.1% higher than that for room nights booked via the Internet. Travel agent bookings account for 84.9% of total room nights booked electronically through the GDSs.
The rising tide of hospitality business is lifting all boats, though. The travel agent bookings showed a 5.0% increase in ADR and a 13.9% increase in revenue versus the first quarter of 2005, while online consumer-booked room nights saw a 2.7% rise in ADR and 5.8% in revenue.
**
I’m sure Rich won’t let me get away without mentioning my upcoming induction into HFTP’s Technology Hall of Fame, so let me just say that I am moved and deeply honored to receive this recognition. I’m even more delighted that this years other inductee is John Burns, who encouraged me to take the plunge into consultancy ten years ago, and has been a constant supporter, guide and friend ever since.
**
Back to Top...
PEOPLE ON THE MOVE
- John Burns and Jon Inge to be inducted into the HFTP Hospitality Technology Hall of Fame
- Kim Tisdale and Laura Brouk hired by SynXis as Vice President of Service Delivery and Vice President of Business Development, respectively
- Jim Mitchell promoted to EVP Information Technology at La Quinta
- Debbie Leander launches Turning Stone Software for design and development services.
Industry consultants John Burns and Jon Inge will be inducted into the HFTP International Hospitality Technology Hall of Fame at this year’s HITEC conference.
Mr. Burns is president of Hospitality Technology Consulting, working with hotel chains and independent hotels worldwide to help them optimize their central reservations and electronic distribution programs. Born and educated in Canada, he began his hotel career managing university conference centers, and subsequently became director of reservation services for Hyatt International. Mr. Burns later worked at Ramada, Inc. as director of property systems support for all technology at Ramada's owned/managed properties and for the Ramada and Rodeway electronic distribution programs. After serving as VP of product development at THISCO (now Pegasus Solutions) he founded Hospitality Technology Consulting in 1992.
Mr. Inge is president of Jon Inge and Associates, advising hotels from 10-room independents to international chains on finding the right mix of systems for their specific operational needs. Born and educated in England, his hotel career has been evenly divided between the vendor, hotel and consulting arenas. He served eight years with pioneer PMS vendor Micor, Inc. and its successor, Galler Hospitality, managing international distributor support and PMS installations, training and customer support. After two years with NCR Corp. as project manager for a major custom PMS development, he served ten years with Westin Hotels & Resorts managing its systems planning and implementations worldwide. Mr. Inge established his own consulting practice in 1996.
**
Kim Tisdale and Laura Brouk have joined SynXis’ senior management team.
Ms. Tisdale, as Vice President of Service Delivery, will manage SynXis implementations and data services team, including its new call center operations in the United States and Uruguay. She brings over 17 years of experience in the hotel industry, most recently as Director of Electronic Distribution Services for Millennium & Copthorne Hotels, and has also held various positions at Hilton International and Forte Hotels.
Ms. Brouk, as Vice President of Business Development, will create a new team within SynXis to help properties maximize their revenue. With 18 years experience in the hospitality business, she has held positions in operations, sales and revenue management at both the property and corporate level for several chains, including Marriott, Starwood, Interstate and most recently Wyndham International as Vice President of Revenue Management. In 2004 she was named one of the 25 Most Extraordinary Minds in Hospitality Sales and Marketing by HSMAI.
**
Jim Mitchell has been promoted to Executive Vice President Information Technology at La Quinta; he was previously Vice President of Business Solutions. Mr. Mitchell joined La Quinta in 2001 after five years with Choice Hotels International, where he was responsible for international technologies and property systems. Prior to Choice, he managed the hospitality franchise system software development department for EDS.
**
Debbie Leander, former Daylight Software VP of Product Management, has formed Turning Stone Software to provide software design and development contract services for applications, interfaces and custom technology projects.
**
Back to Top...
PROPERTY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
- Softwear Group announced INNterprise multi-property management system
The Softwear Group announced its INNterprise multi-property management application, an extension of its INNcompass PMS. Described as a hybrid centralized / distributed system, it can be configured as either a centralized or distributed system, aligned more or less in either direction depending on the exact needs of any particular hotel company. (www.softweargroup.com)
**
Back to Top...
RESERVATIONS
- Hampshire Hospitality & Leisure selects TravelCLICK's iHotelier for 48 properties
- House of Blues Hotel in Chicago switches to iHotelier
- UK’s Thomson announces formation of Thomson Labs, to showcase new technologies
Hampshire Hospitality & Leisure has selected TravelCLICK's iHotelier central reservation system to power the distribution strategy (including website reservations and GDS connectivity) for its forty-eight properties throughout Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands and the Netherlands Antilles.
The 367-room House of Blues Hotel in Chicago has switched to TravelCLICK's iHotelier Central Reservation System (CRS) for its GDS connectivity and online booking engine. The House of Blues Hotel will also use TravelCLICK's market intelligence solutions, including Hotelligence and FuturePACE.
(www.hampshire-hotels.com, www.houseofblueshotel.com, www.travelclick.net)
**
UK travel company Thomson announced the formation of Thomson Labs, which will showcase new ideas to existing customers and give them the opportunity to help develop future travel technology. Three technologies that could impact travel in the near future were identified as biometric fingerprint scanning for retrieval of personal booking information at a travel kiosk, airport check-in desk or hotel, Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) linked to bar-code reading mobile phones for online retrieval of data keyed to a printed advertisement or reservation confirmation bar code, allowing RFID-triggered check-in, and Voice Search technology for hands-free search requests via mobile phone browsers.
**
Back to Top...
MARKETING / MANAGEMENT
- Softwear Group announces Chain-Link CRO/guest recognition system to bridge multi-franchise PMSs
- Starwood contracts with Leonardo Media for online media-content distribution
- Leonardo completes Phase One of Content Integration Partnership with ICE Portal
- NORTHWIND announces Maestro Guest Experience Management (GEM) application
The Softwear Group announced its multi-property Chain-Link application, targeted at management/ ownership groups that operate several properties under different franchise brand flags. The system bridges the different PMSs used by the brands, allowing the management/ ownership group to run a single CRO to make bookings at any of them, and to consolidate guest profile and stay data into a single guest-recognition program across all the hotels. (www.softweargroup.com)
**
Starwood Hotels & Resorts has contracted with Leonardo Media for online media-content distribution (including static and moving property images, logos, maps, etc.) to all GDSs and e-distribution channels and resellers such as Pegasus, Opodo, Yahoo!, Orbitz and Worldres, for all of its brands.
Leonardo has completed Phase One of its Content Integration Partnership with ICE Portal. ICE’s digital brochures with rich media, or moving content, can now be included in Leonardo’s delivery to its network of GDS and travel distribution channels; ICE Portal can custom brand the digital brochures for each channel and have the content delivered with ICE’s SmartLink technology. Phase Two of the partnership is in development, and will focus on increasing visibility for small to medium size hotel groups and independents.
(www.starwoodhotels.com, www.iceportal.com, www.leonardo.com)
**
NORTHWIND announced its Maestro Guest Experience Management (GEM) application, designed to capture and analyze guest responses to online comment cards. Developed with business intelligence vendor Navicom, GEM is integrated with Maestro Enterprise Front Office to link responses to each guest’s record. Maestro GEM automatically emails a post-checkout ‘thank you’ note with a link that offers a chance to win a prize for participating in a property survey. This includes questions about future marketing initiatives and amenities, and gives guests the option to trigger a ‘red flag’ that immediately notifies the property to contact them. The guest responses are subjected to statistical analysis to help determine future priorities and strategies. (www.maestropms.com)
**
Back to Top...
REVENUE MANAGEMENT
- Hotel Istana, Kuala Lumpur, has selected Optims
The 516-room Hotel Istana Kuala Lumpur has selected Optims Hotel Revenue Management System, which will be interfaced with the hotel’s Fidelio v7 PMS. (www.optims.com)
**
Back to Top...
F&B/POINT OF SALE
- MICROS to resell VeriFone's customer-activated electronic payment applications
MICROS Systems will resell VeriFone's customer-activated electronic payment applications, fully integrated with MICROS RES 4.0. Products included in the agreement are the new Vx 670 mobile payment system and QX720 outdoor payment system, the Omni 7000 family and the multimedia-enabled MX870. The integrated pay-at-the-table approach provides a more secure way to collect payments and supports the consumer shift to PIN debit. (www.verifone.com, www.micros.com)
**
Back to Top...
GUEST SERVICES
- HFTP provides glimpse of technologies to be featured in GUESTROOM 2010 hotel room
- Choice selects EthoStream for high-speed Internet to 800+ Econo Lodge locations
HFTP has provided a “teaser” glimpse of the technologies to be featured in its GUESTROOM 2010 prototype hotel room at HITEC this June. Rather than list all the different devices, HFTP stated that “Guestroom 2010 and its adjacent pavilion will feature a bed without a mattress, a 3D TV without the accompanying glasses, a shower that cleans itself, a sound that helps you concentrate, light and art that match your mood, a valet that is always there, a faucet that recharges itself, an alarm clock that hides if you don't wake up, a highly unusual room design, and many other items.”
**
Choice Hotels has selected EthoStream to roll out high-speed Internet to its 800+ Econo Lodge franchise locations. EthoStream has added proprietary Choice technology into its EGS v4.0 gateway, which will be re-branded as the Econo Lodge Internet Gateway. EthoStream will provide support for the property guests as well as system management and monitoring. (www.choicehotels.com, www.ethostream.com)
**
Back to Top...
BACK OFFICE
- M3’s AccKnowledge hosted accounting application offers Flex Budgeting
M3’s AccKnowledge hosted accounting application now offers a Flex Budgeting module, designed to show management how much money is in select income and expense accounts in relation to the hotel’s budget. (www.hotelaccounting.com)
**
Back to Top...
COMMUNICATIONS
- Percipia establishes strategic relationship with Hong Kong’s Symphonic InfoCom
Percipia has established a liaison office and strategic relationship with Hong Kong’s Symphonic InfoCom Ltd to grow market share for its hospitality IP systems in Hong Kong and China. Symphonic InfoCom will provide local installation and customer support. (www.percipia.com)
**
Back to Top...
