Time Travel - Hospitality Technology in 2020! | By Vissal Mathew

'A global village' is a simple term compared to the offering that the travel industry would make. The travel industry will find the need to provide precise distinctions of experiences offered. Choices would be much wider, for example, one would not travel for the pleasure of diving -- but instead, for either open water diving or wreck diving or cave diving or even ice diving! The flipside however, is that with technology such as hydrogen aircrafts, the Earth will become a much smaller place, with destinations more accessible, making dream-like destinations a reality.

Development is definitely going to be much quicker and the decade to come will progress two-fold, when compared to the growth of technology in the past two decades. Technology sure does not know saturation and that is the reason that hotels & establishments that used a mere accounting software as a part of their computerized operations, now look for a full fledged property management system that manages every aspect of the hotels operations and guest aspirations.

While these defined experiences will offer a wide choice to travelers, hotels world-wide would need to in return, meet the guest's expectations by seamlessly meeting his cultural needs in terms of food & local nuances, preferences and so on! Imagine, walking in to a restaurant in Yokkaichi, Japan and being suggested a full Japanese meal that would match your taste without upsetting your stomach!

And just how would that be possible?

Centralized Pool of Guest Information:
Finding accurate data from a plethora of information is the challenge time will need to address. The requirement would be to understand backgrounds, food habits and climatic conditions of potential guests. Hotels will soon share a centralized pool of guest information, since loyalty will be a difficult term to maintain! The possibilities are immense. Information now proprietary will in the future become public domain. This resource pool would be so large that a hotel expecting a guest could do something as simple as 'Google a Guest' to understand his preferences and maximize their revenue through subtle recommendations.

Reduced Points of Contact:
This global database will make people more sensitive about intrusion which will further lead to reduced points of contact, procedures and processes and make individuality more a priority that it has ever been. Here, mobile telephony will play an important role by becoming the basis of almost every transaction, eliminating points of contact. However, free exchange of information across the planet (and maybe outside of it too!) will quite likely take place on a common platform.

Virtual ID and Face Detection:
What will make this global database accurate and informative? In layman terms, Virtual ID and Face detection are the answers. The face of an individual would trigger an e-commerce transaction. The Virtual ID will replace the Driving License, Passport, Credit card and other such important documents that one cannot imagine traveling without today. On the contrary, the Virtual ID will also make travel difficult for anti-social elements, thus making security a by-product of this technology! This virtual ID will in time be recognized anywhere in the world and would also make Credit Rating a thing of the past and in all likelihood eliminate the need for paper money!!

The New 'Avatar':
Travel Agents would take a different avatar, elevating their profile to a different level, where they would recommend travel based on related information of the guest. Selling would happen peer-to-peer, promoting services, benefiting oneself by earning incentives on recommendation and past experiences of similar profiles. Human resources would be elevated to address knowledge & quality based requirements rather than engaging in day-to-day mundane tasks at all levels of operations, as we do today.

The world to speak a 'Single' Language:
We are headed towards a world that will speak a single language, a universal communication platform, perhaps the use of a standard set of symbols & codes, understood by the global traveler, a language which will not require interpreters or re-explanations. And this is what will make one feel at home at Yokkaichi, Japan too!

This could soon be reality, for, who would have imagined that umpiring decisions would be made so easy & accurate in a game like cricket, where there is no scope for benefit of doubt given to the batsman anymore! Technology available is able to do what was considered humanly impossible just a few years ago! It wouldn't be surprising if in the future, two high definition cameras replace the umpires on field! Let us welcome a decade of information which will be accurate, detailed and easily accessible, leading to a more satisfied guest experience!