Innovation

🏖 Singapore, October 23, 2025 – South Palms Resort & Spa Panglao, part of the MGallery Collection in Bohol, Philippines, enhances services with Infrasys Cloud POS by Shiji. This cloud technology optimizes operations across 188+ rooms, dining, spa, and leisure venues, providing seamless guest experiences. The integration allows centralized reporting and data-driven decisions. Shiji serves over 91,000 hotels globally with 5,000 employees. Key figures Steven Hopkinson and Terence Ronson emphasized the improved guest experience.

🏨 Voyages Indigenous Tourism Australia, managing Ayers Rock Resort and Mossman Gorge Cultural Centre, faced challenges with fragmented feedback systems. Prior feedback methods were lengthy, inconsistent, and often delayed. Low survey participation and decentralized online review management added to the issues. To improve, Voyages adopted Reviewpro Reputation for real-time insights, consolidating guest feedback into a single system for faster service recovery and enhanced operational efficiency.

📈 Wyndham Hotels & Resorts saw a 4% YOY growth in system-wide rooms and a record 257,000 rooms in its development pipeline. Q3 RevPAR decreased by 5% compared to last year, with a projected full-year decline of 2% to 3%. 70% of Wyndham's pipeline is in midscale and above segments, with 58% international. AI agents improved direct bookings, contributing to nearly 300 basis points of improvement in hotel direct contributions. Wyndham launched a $95 travel subscription for enhanced customer perks.

🏨 20+ years ago, hotel marketing was revolutionized by the internet; today, AI is set to transform it again. Conor Grennan identifies four common pitfalls in AI adoption. The rise of retail media is challenged by budget cuts and measurement issues, urging better analytics. A $1 million ad was created using Google's AI with no cameras. The "Paypal Mafia" of hotel marketing, WIHP, was instrumental in launching many innovative hotel tech startups.

📨 Max Extranet introduces Expedia Guest Messaging Integration, enabling hoteliers to manage Expedia conversations in real time from the Bookings Module. This upgrade improves guest engagement by allowing direct replies, instant notifications, and sharing of text, images, and PDFs. For example, Blue Horizon Beach Resort can seamlessly arrange airport transfers via messaging. Notifications are immediate, aiding swift responses, and communication is recorded for departmental visibility, enhancing workflow efficiency.

🚄 Eurostar is investing €2 billion in 50 new double-decker trains by Alstom, enhancing capacity and sustainability. The Eurostar Celestia will debut in January 2031, aiming for 30 million annual passengers. Each 200m train will offer around 540 seats, with 1,080 seats in a 400m formation. The fleet will bring 350 new jobs at London’s Temple Mills depot, which will be upgraded for €80 million. The total fleet will increase by 30% to 67 trains.

📈 Hilton reported a 1.1% decline in Q3 global RevPAR, with the Middle East and Africa seeing a 9.9% increase. Net income was $421 million. As of September 2025, Hilton's development pipeline reached 515,400 rooms. The company opened 199 hotels, including the 9,000th property. It announced its 25th brand, Outset Collection, with over 60 hotels in development. Hilton plans net unit growth of 6.5% to 7% for 2025 and beyond.