Advertisement

Central & South America - Latest

Hotel Yearbook Article The Hotel Yearbook 2026 - Annual Edition

How AI is Powering Efficiency and Imagination in Hospitality Design

Lisa A. Haude, Principal-Interior Designer at Studio RYS, shows how AI is becoming a practical creative partner in the studio. She describes using AI to speed up drafting, modeling, admin work, and BIM based visualisation, letting designers test more ideas, reduce errors, and give clients richer, real time ways to see and shape a project. Her main point is that AI should stay in the background as a tool for precision and sustainability insight, while the human side storytelling, taste, and emotional sense of place remains what makes hospitality design truly memorable.

Lisa A. Haude
By Lisa A. Haude, Principal-Interior Design, Studio RYS, Studio RYS (formerly RYS Architects)
Development Renovation

Hyatt Announces Newly Enhanced Secrets Playa Mujeres Golf & Spa Resort Following Extensive Renovation

Hyatt Hotels Corporation (NYSE: H) has announced the reopening of Secrets Playa Mujeres Golf & Spa Resort, an adults-only, all-inclusive haven, following a transformative renovation. These new updates reaffirm Hyatt's commitment to mainstay destinations and elevate the refined experience guests have come to know from the Secrets Resorts & Spas brand.

Secrets Resorts & Spas
Cancún, Mexico
Hotel Yearbook Article The Hotel Yearbook 2026 - Annual Edition

Why Presence is the Next Amenity

Susie Arnett of Six Senses explains that as hotel service becomes more automated, the real value of hospitality moves back to the human relationship between guest and host. Drawing on lessons from retreat centres, she shows why future staff must act more like guides than service workers, and why training should focus on presence and emotional intelligence so guests feel truly seen, not just served.

Susie Arnett
By Susie Arnett, Director of Wellness Programming, Six Senses
Hotel Yearbook Article The Hotel Yearbook 2026 - Annual Edition

Bringing it All Together: How All-Inclusive Resorts Changed the Narrative

As all inclusive resorts shed their old value only reputation and reemerge as serious players in the upscale leisure space, Ricardo Orozco Arce of The Villa Group shows how the category’s revival is powered by “hybrid by design” thinking. He maps the unlikely pairings redefining the model luxury and explains how blending these forces can broaden appeal, deepen loyalty and keep the guest experience feeling effortless and worth it at every step.

Ricardo Orozco Arce
By Ricardo Orozco Arce, Vice President Operations, The Villa Group
Hotel Yearbook Article The Hotel Yearbook 2026 - Annual Edition

The Growth Code: Why Human Investment is the Ultimate Advantage in an AI Era

As hotels race to automate, Tanja Stegmüller, co-founder of TRUSTmenti, makes the case that resilience will come from intentional hybridity: blending digital efficiency with human wisdom, global standards with local soul, and automation with empathy. She lays out a ten point playbook for building hybrid leaders, learning ecosystems, and people centred cultures, arguing that technology can handle tasks, but only humans can deliver judgment, emotion, and the moments that define great hospitality.

Tanja Stegmüller
By Tanja Stegmüller, Co-Founder, TRUSTmenti
Ad #1 Hotel PMS
See why hotels are switching to Mews

Revenue up. Manual work down. Hotels using Mews see 35% higher RevPAR and 45% more upsells. Book a free demo. 
Mews
Hotel Yearbook Article The Hotel Yearbook 2026 - Annual Edition

Closing the personalization gap: Why hotels still struggle to connect online promises with offline reality

Hotels have perfected AI powered personalization online, yet the experience often falls flat on property because guest insights stay trapped in fragmented systems and are not translated into simple, actionable cues for front line teams. Floor explains how unified data layers, predictive and agentic AI, and open standards like MCP could finally bridge this digital physical gap, as long as hotels pair the tech with training and a culture that turns insights into meaningful moments.

Floor Bleeker
By Floor Bleeker, Global technology executive, board advisor, and investor, IN2 Consulting
Hotel Yearbook Article The Hotel Yearbook 2026 - Annual Edition

AI Adoption in Hospitality: Meet People Where They Are

AI may be rewriting hospitality’s playbook, but the toughest part of adoption is not the software, it is the quiet anxieties it triggers on the front line. By tracing three common fears that surface whenever AI enters the workplace, Lynn Zwibak shows how leaders can turn resistance into readiness and make change something teams help build rather than brace against.

Lynn Zwibak
By Lynn Zwibak, Founder & CEO, Zwibak | Commercial Strategy
Development Renovation

RIU Hotels Sees Out 2025 by Reopening the Riu Jalisco Following a Full Refurb

RIU Hotels & Resorts has reopened the doors of the iconic hotel Riu Jalisco, located in Riviera Nayarit, following the completion of an ambitious renovation project. The establishment has undergone an extensive transformation to add a variety of new dining options, as well as create a special area for the youngest members of the family that includes a splash pad with slides. In parallel to the refurbishment, work was carried out to extend the hotel and add 120 rooms in a newly constructed area.

RIU
Nuevo Vallarta, Mexico
Scott Dahl
By Scott Dahl
Expert Views (7)
Muhammad Tanveer
Muhammad Tanveer, Author - The Sales Leadership Brief (Linkedin Newsletter), The Sales Leadership Brief

This is a pivotal shift. The issue is no longer which channels we use, but who controls the guest narrative and the data behind it. Hotels will not win by fighting OTAs on scale or ad spend. We win by aligning revenue, marketing, and sales around a single guest intelligence strategy using data to drive relevance, not just reach.

Ira Vouk
Ira Vouk, Hospitality Tech and AI Consultant, Hospitality 2.0 Consulting

OpenAI, Google and Perplexity will reshape this landscape again. Nobody knows how exactly but 2 years from now the picture will be very different.

Markus Mueller
Markus Mueller, Managing Director, GauVendi

Stop playing the OTA game—change the game with the product. Yes, third parties are taking control of search, booking flows, and traveler data—but copying their playbook won't reclaim the guest relationship. If you try to "out-CRM" Expedia or "out-loyalty" Airbnb, you're choosing a scale game you can't win.

View all Answers
Ad AI Hospitality
Ernest - Lighthouse's AI for hoteliers

"Just tell me why my weekend pickup dropped." With Ernest, now you can ask your commercial data anything, and act on the answer. 
Lighthouse
Development Pipeline

Montage Plans for 62-key Montage Valle De Guadalupe In Baja California

Montage International in partnership with leading real estate and development firm, Thor Urbana, and growing luxury community pioneer and club operator, Life Properties International (LIFE), announce the development of a new luxury resort, Montage Valle de Guadalupe, located within the iconic Bruma Wine Estate in Valle de Guadalupe, Mexico. Anticipated to open in 2028, the sprawling resort will be Montage International's fifth property in Mexico, following its flagship Mexican resort, Montage Los Cabos, which opened in 2018. Montage and Pendry Punta Mita and Pendry Mexico City are currently in development.

Montage Hotels & Resorts
Guadalupe, Mexico
Development Opening

Where Contemporary Luxury Meets Mexico's Coastal Soul: Park Hyatt Cabo del Sol Opens its Doors

Hyatt Hotels Corporation (NYSE: H) and RLH Properties today announced the official debut of Park Hyatt Cabo del Sol, the first Park Hyatt branded hotel in Mexico, as a welcomed addition to Hyatt's luxury portfolio brand footprint in one of the world's most beloved beach destinations. Set along a pristine stretch of coastline within the private Cabo del Sol community, this new resort brings the contemporary luxury of the Park Hyatt brand to the easygoing spirit of Baja California Sur.

Park Hyatt
Cabo San Lucas, Mexico
Simone Puorto
By Simone Puorto
Expert Views (12)
Muhammad Tanveer
Muhammad Tanveer, Author - The Sales Leadership Brief (Linkedin Newsletter), The Sales Leadership Brief

The idea of AI-crafted reviews doesn't worry me as much as the possibility of losing the emotional color that real guests bring to the table. Yes, quick prompts will make feedback easier and remove a lot of noise but hospitality has always lived in the small details that guests describe in their own words.

Ira Vouk
Ira Vouk, Hospitality Tech and AI Consultant, Hospitality 2.0 Consulting

Can the future of hotel reviews be completely AI-generated? - Yes. Will it? Only if we think reviews will continue to be read by humans, which is highly unlikely, as already they're mostly digested by LLMs through semantic analysis to derive trends, sentiment, and suggested areas of improvement.

Erik Muñoz
Erik Muñoz, Business Development Director EMEA, TrustYou

In the next 3–7 years, expect: 95% of reviews to be AI-generated from structured input, platforms to become "reputation orchestrators", users to see personalized, not universal, review summaries, hotels to optimize for models, not guests, because models shape guest choice.

View all Answers
Development Opening

Park Hyatt Cabo del Sol Opens its Doors

Hyatt Hotels Corporation and RLH Properties have officially debuted Park Hyatt Cabo del Sol, marking the first Park Hyatt branded hotel in Mexico and expanding Hyatt's luxury footprint in Los Cabos. Located on a beachfront stretch inside the private Cabo del Sol community in Baja California Sur, the resort positions itself as a high-end, design-led retreat that blends contemporary Park Hyatt sensibilities with the laid-back spirit of the region.

Park Hyatt
Cabo San Lucas, Mexico
Development Opening

York Medellin Opens as Hilton’s First Curio Collection by Hilton Hotel in Medellín

Today, Hilton (NYSE: HLT) announces the opening of York Medellin, Curio Collection by Hilton, marking the lifestyle brand's debut in Colombia's vibrant second-largest city. The hotel is the 27th Hilton property in Colombia and the third Curio Collection by Hilton in the country, following Cartagena and Bogota. Hilton's lifestyle brands are expecting unstoppable growth in the Caribbean and Latin America with nearly 40 open hotels and plans to welcome nearly 40 properties, offering travelers immersive, one-of-a-kind experiences in some of the world's most sought-after destinations.

Curio – A Collection by Hilton
Medellín, Colombia