😎 It’s the dream scenario for every hotelier right now… AI agents disrupt OTAs. Millions of travelers bypassing the OTAs and booking direct. Bye bye commissions! Hello freedom.
But will AI agents choose the direct channel over OTAs any more than travelers do now?
And how will Agent-to-Agent (A2A) direct bookings actually work?
Pablo Delgado Díaz-Pache raises some of these questions in his article.
Here’s my take:
I think some of these challenges get solved if the approach is to put the responsibility for handling AI agent bookings on the supplier’s side vs the traveler’s side.
By that I mean that all the logic should be on the suppliers side (perhaps using MCP), so that any travelers AI agent can access the suppliers system to make queries for available rooms, choose rooms and add ons, and make bookings.
The suppliers side feeds the travelers AI agent with everything it needs. All it has to do is just follow the path, similar to how a human navigates a supplier’s booking engine.
The supplier’s AI server leads the travelers AI agent and feeds it with options to choose from, like a step by step menu.
I believe the technical hurdles will all get solved. For me, the bigger question is one of incentives — getting the traveler’s agent to choose the direct channel vs OTAs.
This is what I’m focused on solving – creating the right incentives for travelers and their AI agents to choose the direct channel rather than OTA middlemen.
So how do hoteliers’ dreams become reality?
Agentic AI for hotel bookings? Technically possible—but only after overcoming critical obstacles to becoming a true distribution channel in hospitality.
Until seamless integration with hotel CRSs is achieved, incentives -including a revenue model- are aligned for both suppliers and customers, AI-driven bookings will remain more informative than transactional.
Mirai #AgenticAI
