John F. Davis, III, Chariman & CEO - Pegasus Solutions, Inc - The Perennial Entrepreneur - John F. Davis III is well familiar with start-ups, having launched several earlier in his career. Most notably was 800-Flowers, which he eventually sold and it became known as the very popular 1-800 Flowers. He then founded a telemarketing company, ATC, which by 1988 grew to become one of the nation's largest providers of outbound and inbound telemarketing services.
His most successful start-up to date is now the world's largest provider of reservations-related technology services to the hotel industry. When Davis was approached in 1988 to launch Pegasus, his only related experience was that he had stayed in a couple of hotels and had used a computer a couple of times. Today, Davis is one of the hotel industry's most well-known and respected visionaries and has been recognized several times over for his contribution to the hotel industry. When he launched Pegasus in 1989, he had one employee and 800 square feet of office space - today Pegasus has 1,500 employees in 22 offices in 16 countries, and just last week took over 90,000 square feet of office space at the Campbell Centre in Dallas, with Pegasus logos visibly posted on the office tower for all to see as they drive up and down Central Expressway.
Through his entrepreneurial drive and goal to create a new product or business every three years, Davis led Pegasus to launch several of its own start-ups - companies that ultimately became businesses within Pegasus Solutions. In every instance, he created an "industry first" - a product or service that had never before been available in the hotel industry. Davis has several more ideas brewing, and intends to continue down the successful entrepreneurial path he started many years ago.
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Dallas-based Pegasus Solutions, Inc. (www.pegs.com) is a leading global provider of hotel reservations-related services and technology. Its services include central reservations systems; electronic distribution services that connect more than 45,000 hotels to the Internet and to the global distribution systems (GDS); travel agent commission processing and payment services; the Utell marketing and reservation representation service (www.Utell.com); and PegasusCentral™, a Web-based enterprise solution with property management applications. Pegasus' customers comprise the majority of travel agencies around the world, including the top 10 largest U.S.-based travel agencies2; more than 48,000 hotel properties around the globe, including all of the 50 largest hotel brands in the world based on total number of guest rooms1; and thousands of Web sites/services have their hotel reservations Powered by Pegasus™. In addition to its corporate headquarters in Dallas, Pegasus has 20 offices in 11 countries, including regional hubs in Phoenix, London and Singapore. The company's stock is traded on the Nasdaq National Market under the symbol PEGS.
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This year's AH&LA Multiunit Lodging Operators & Owners Forum focused on how the various Internet distribution channels are affecting the hotel business and gave attendees methods to effectively manage these channels. Conference speakers included John F. Davis, CEO Pegasus Solutions, Inc., Chris Soder, EVP of Lodging and Vacation Industries, Priceline.com and David Litman, CEO, Hotels.com.
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Kevin Heilbronner is the US Editor for wiredhotelier.com and hospitalitynet.org, providing streaming multimedia-content for these websites. Based outside of Washington DC, Heilbronner has worked with Hsyndicate to conduct interviews at several hospitality trade shows in the US and Europe over the last couple of years. His column and content are featured in the Hospitality Net weekly newsletter. A familiar voice in Washington, DC, Heilbronner is the stadium announcer for the NBA's Washington Wizards, WNBA's Washington Mystics and WUSA's Washington Freedom. He resides in Centreville, VA and can be reached via email: [email protected].
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