Recorded at the Hoteliers' Voice Stratford-Upon-Avon roundtable, the episode features Celtic Collection, Kings Court Hotel, Oracle, and HOSPA on cloud migration, tech investment priorities, and future-ready hotel operations.
The GM of The Gallivant, a MICHELIN-key boutique hotel in East Sussex, explains how independents can outmaneuver chains using agile tech stacks, AI tools, and fast iteration cycles.
A podcast episode exploring how Kenilworth Hotel used Eccobell's Belle platform, deployed via in-room QR codes in August 2025, to shift front desk workload from admin tasks to genuine hospitality.
The reality is much more complex than black and white. There are already many humanless hotels (mostly in Asia). So there will be: - regional differences in approach to human vs machine balance - variations between different segments (short-term rentals adopted self-service from the get go, many limited service hotel properties followed, but we won't expect to see if in the luxury segment any time soon, maybe never) It will be a spectrum.
In the future, a purely automated, no-human operational model will increasingly become the way of things. For this to fully materialize, our industry and our customer will have accepted all forms of artificial intelligence—both soft and hard.
No. Humanless hotels will become more common, but they are unlikely to become the norm.Automation and AI are excellent for repetitive tasks like check-in, payments, and guest requests, helping hotels reduce costs and improve efficiency.
Apaleo names Connor Neeson as Country Lead for UK and Ireland, targeting operators still reliant on legacy PMS as pressure mounts to modernise technology infrastructure.
Mews announced five new native features at Unfold 2026 in Amsterdam: guest messaging, workflow automations, BI dashboards, integrated RMS, and accounting, all sharing one data model and UI.
We didn't go to HITEC 2026 for the demos. We went for the conversations. We sat down with exhibitors right there on the show floor. No script, no prepared questions, just one starting point: tell us what you do, in plain language. This is where it went with Ricky Daniels, Co-Founder of Trybe.
Finland's first carbon-neutral hotel chain has deployed Canary's digital check-in, AI messaging, and upsell tools across its five-property portfolio.
Alliants will deploy its Experience Platform across Premier Inn's 95,000+ rooms in the UK and Germany, enabling guests to store room keys in Apple or Google digital wallets for contactless entry.
PPHE Hotel Group is deploying Hudini's platform across 17 European properties, including a guest web app, mobile room keys, self-service kiosks, and staff tools to streamline operations and personalise guest journeys.
HotelRunner founders Arden Agopyan and Ali Beklen were shortlisted among 5,000+ applicants for Global Entrepreneur of the Year at the 2026 Allica Bank Great British Entrepreneur Awards.
Otherwander Soho, a 566-pod digital hotel on Dean Street, chose Apaleo's open PMS after a 4.5-year tech evaluation, enabling keyless entry, online check-in, and a reception-free operating model.
Classic Norway Hotels cut forecast error by ~50% across 22 properties using Demand Calendar's automated BI platform, reducing Excel use by 95% and aligning all departments on a single nightly-updated forecast.
Wilhelm Luxem, Head of Quality Commission at Swiss Deluxe Hotels, shares how luxury properties can adopt technology while preserving authentic human connection, drawing on a 50-year career.
United States will never adopt the same ruling. It's a capitalist country where businesses needs (not the government) dictate business actions. Smart operators will implement automation where it makes sense and where it augments "human touch".
The classic philosophy in hospitality is that guests require services provided by super nice, smiling, well-trained humans. I believe this philosophy is greatly exaggerated, especially today. A great example of why guests do not care about human-provided services comes from the vacation rental sector.Today, 20% of roomnights are consumed at vacation rentals/ short-term rentals: houses, villas, condos and apartments.
So far I haven't personally seen AI actually cut jobs. I'm not saying it hasn't but I haven't personally seen it yet. It has however empowered people to do a whole lot more, so it might slow down future hires. But I haven't seen it replace anyone that was hired, unless the person utterly refused to learn how to use AI.
Kelly Ommundsen of the World Economic Forum argues hospitality tech is over-designed for confident users, under-regulated, and too often deployed without asking what problem it actually solves.
Gain Advisors received the Mews 2026 Strategic Star Award at the Mews Unfold forum in Amsterdam, recognizing its advisory model built on senior hospitality practitioners driving measurable commercial outcomes for hoteliers.
Mirko Lalli warns that 80% of AI travel suggestions come from OTAs, leaving most hotels invisible, and argues that 70% of the fix is content strategy, not technology.
Bold prediction: The PMS isn't going anywhere by 2030 — but it will look nothing like it does today. It becomes the heart of the hotel, connecting and coordinating most AI tools, agents and decisions running across the property.
The death of the PMS was mooted back in 2014 when I joined hospitality from airlines. 14 years later, we still have PMSes. Their primary all-in-one functions were:- Handle check-in/out- Manage room key cutting- Take payments- Set up the hotel room inventory and types- Assign a price per room- Link to selling channels like OTAs- Manage housekeeping- Manage facilities management/maintenance- Handle on-site eventsSeparate RMSes now do pricing and push rates to PMSes.
The Enterprise PMS will still be around in 2030. Every hotel needs a system of record to manage reservations, inventory, rates, guest profiles, financial transactions, and operational controls. AI doesn't remove that requirement.
HSMAI Europe's newly launched AI Advisory Board, chaired by TrustYou's Ben Jost, will produce white papers, case studies and education content covering AI content strategy, direct channels and hotel tech architecture.