As 2025 unfolds, the business travel sector stands at an intersection of tradition and transformation. While the fundamental need for face-to-face interactions in business remains unchanged, the way that companies approach and manage travelling for work has undergone a significant evolution.
The rise of distributed workforces and the emergence of new technologies have reshaped business travel’s purpose and execution. As organisations navigate this new landscape, they’re discovering that business travel serves as a crucial bridge between digital efficiency and human connection, becoming more strategic and purposeful than ever before.
Over the next year, this evolution will continue to accelerate. We will also see a broader shift in how companies view travelling for work: not just as a necessary business function, but as a strategic tool for fostering collaboration and driving growth in an increasingly global business environment.
The evolving role of corporate travel
Over the past five years we’ve seen a rise in hybrid and remote working models, which initially some may have seen as a threat to the industry. However, with in-person connections still crucial to productivity, there’s been minimal impact on the sector. Our Value of Business Travel report, published in June 2024, showed that 62% of CEOs expected their travel budgets to increase in 2024, compared to 2023.
Those who are travelling for work will continue to do so because it’s part of their job. Whether it’s for sales or to install a wind turbine, they need to be on the ground and in-person.
This year, I’ve seen that as companies expand their search for top talent, the workforce has become increasingly distributed globally. Therefore, companies have adopted a ‘hub’ model with multiple locations with a specialised focus, such as sales, customer care or engineering hubs. As companies operate across borders, face-to-face meetings become crucial for bridging cultural differences and fostering team collaboration. As a result of this hub mentality, smaller, focused gatherings have grown and are staying together for longer. It’s about aligning teams across locations to solve specific challenges effectively.
Trends shaping the travel management sector
One of the biggest trends in business travel is decentralisation of trip booking – the shift from one person booking all company travel to the employees booking their own. Employees gain ownership of their travel as well as flexibility. This model is critical as hybrid, remote and global teams become the norm and as a company scales.
Decentralised travel systems empower employees to manage their bookings, and while in the past that meant a lack of control over expenses and compliance, travel management tools give control and visibility back to the business by providing oversight without burdening travel managers with logistical complexities.
The role of AI
This year I expect to see big changes in the consumer travel industry thanks to AI, mainly related to user interface (UI). Whether it’s generative AI enhancing travel planning or AI agents supporting travellers. Innovations in UI typically emerge in consumer tech first, which is lower risk and quicker to adopt. Once these tools mature, the business travel industry will likely integrate them in quick succession.
For the corporate travel industry, AI is a gradual, strategic investment. Companies that leverage it thoughtfully—focusing on data and innovation—will lead the way. Treating AI as a plug-and-play solution, however, will result in missed opportunities and slower progress.
At TravelPerk, we’ve integrated AI to enhance and aid our teams so they can focus on providing a better customer experience. By harnessing the power of AI, we build efficiencies throughout our business operations with a human-first approach, ensuring the technology enhances and doesn’t replace our people.
While AI will eventually exceed our expectations, it won’t disrupt the SaaS industry overnight. Like the invention of the mobile phone or high-speed internet, it requires years of infrastructure development before reaching its peak.
Consolidation in the business travel industry
We’ve seen consolidation across the industry in 2024 and I expect this trend to continue, as the sector has very consistent unit economics. For example, it is easy to build scale when you are adding a simple commodity, such as one plane ticket with another, as compared to a car manufacturer for instance, where infrastructure costs to build 1,000 cars are vastly different to building 10,000 cars.
This simplicity of scale is true for leisure travel, where a few companies own several steps of the journey, and it is also increasingly becoming true of business travel as well.
Looking ahead
With the changes outlined above, the business travel sector is poised for an era of innovation. While technology will continue to reshape how we book, manage and experience corporate travel, the industry’s future will be defined by its ability to balance the benefits of AI automation with human insight. Consolidation will see the emergence of new, more sophisticated tools that continue to grow this industry. Evolving working models will continue to change the industry – but what will remain consistent is the need to build meaningful connections and connect in-person.
