The Swissotel Chicago hotel was renovated this spring with a total investment of $10 million. The hotel decided to invest in new technology to attract more business and improve the overall performance of the hotel. "Updates to the lobby include a new earth-tone color palette and check-in pods in place of a central front desk. All front-desk agents are now equipped with laptops that allow them to roam and check guests in even when they're not stationed at the pods." This new renovated hotel offers a soundtrack of DJ beats, televisions, and multimedia plug-ins. The meeting space also provides the best in technology. "The hotel is the first Chicago property to offer Nervana's Bonfire Events Management app for meeting planners and attendees." This allow event planners to work more efficiently with schedules, flights, meetings and presentations "connects meeting participants through a social media site, and sends alerts for any schedule changes."

The article talks about how the most important gastronomic event in Brazil "The Pernambuco Restaurant Week" was promoted to attract a large population. This festival started 20 years ago in New York and nowadays it takes place in 100 cities around the world. By marketing the festival through different media channels and promoting it through e-marketing the participating restaurants are expecting exposure, brand recognition and an increase of business "The festival is aimed at warming the sales of the restaurants that, in turn, undertake to transfer part of the profit to a social institution. This year the organization was chosen as the Child Citizen Orchestra Boys of coke, which serves 130 youths, between 4 and 19 years." The main sponsor of this famous event was MasterCard giving the brand popularity, position, and exposure in the Brazilian market.

Hilton Americas-Houston has implemented a surveillance system with cutting edge technology from 3Vr Security to provide guests with the best in hotel security and customer service. With 3VR it would be possible to find surveillance footage in couple of seconds. Alan Moore, director of security and life safety for Hilton Americas-Houston claims "I've never seen anything that is able to do the things this technology does; it's light-years ahead of the system we previously used." This new technology will give the hotel a competitive advantage by increasing customer service. For example when it comes to lost and found if a bag was misplaced it can be found very quickly by searching based on color and item. The system recognizes faces that are not guests. Among other uses of the system are counting arriving vehicles, monitoring all accidents including vehicle accidents in the garage that can be useful information for a guest when it comes to insurance purposes.

Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts brand has been recognized by L2 Think Tan's Digital IQ Index: Hotels for the use of plenty digital platforms. By analyzing the needs and wants of guest and potential customers Four Seasons decided to invest in technology obtaining great results. "We are thrilled to be recognized by L2 for our commitment to transforming our guest experience through digital and social media platforms," said Susan Helstab, executive vice president, marketing, Four Seasons. Four Seasons saw the great influence technology has in the way we conduct business and communicate therefore the brand applied the newest technology to create a competitive advantage among its competitive set. "The L2 study reflects just how meaningful this is to the guest experience, and solidifies the importance of Four Seasons continual advancement in the digital realm." Some of the recent innovations Four Season applied to the properties are the new website FourSeasons.com that includes real-time search and videos. It also includes maps, Facebook, and blogs among others. Creating a powerful and global social presence in YouTube, Facebook and Twitter that gives them more publicity, Innovating with Emerging Platforms and Mobile Access "The brand has seen 110% growth year over year of business booked through iPhones and 200% increase via iPads." Four Seasons is attracting more groups, leisure and commercial demand thanks to its technology.

This article talks about the importance of choosing the right accounting software for hotels. Hoteliers need to take into consideration the purpose, functionality and desired results before selecting accounting software which "is used to track the profitability of hotel operations and identify trends in the hospitality industry." In order to select a hotel accounting software it has to match the needs and functions of the premise. Some of the most important factors in the selection process are annual revenue, budget, location, multiple sites, national or international location, and in house vs. outsourced operations. "Accounting software encompasses multiple functions of a hotel's operations, ranging from data mining to running financial reports." Some of the major functions in accounting software are accounts payable, accounts receivable, budgeting, cash management, general ledger, sales analysis, payroll, procurement, order entry, fixed assets, and inventory management. The hospitality industry is reporting increasing demands for internal controls and financial accountability therefore is very important that hotels select the right accounting software because is in charge of keeping records of the hotel's profitability. In addition accounting software reports room rate revenues and discrepancies and use the Generally Accepted Accounting Standards.

MICROS began a partnership with Trump Hotel Collection which will start using in all its properties MICROS OPERA and MICROS POS to provide a unique and superior guest experience. The main focus is that MICROS states that with MICROS OPERA AND MICROS POS will provide to Trump International Hotel & Tower Toronto the most advanced technology for operating the premises, managing accurately customer data, and consolidating Customer Relationship Management. One of the factors why MICROS RES was selected was because of the great operation performance "MICROS RES was selected for its rich restaurant operations functionality." The Corporate Director of Finance of TRUMP HOTEL COLLECTION, Mike Straube, is very satisfied with this new partnership with MICROS because of all the services the company provides "We are pleased to have a single partner that can provide us with the most advanced technology in the industry for both our hotel and restaurant operations. By standardizing on MICROS technology, we are able to replicate our processes to become more efficient and secure, and provide a consistent and superior experience to our clientele."

The ATRIO is a platform that would make big changes in the hospitality industry. ATRIO will be installed at the boutique Hotel Diva of Personality Hotels which will make a competitive advantage among its competitors. "The ATRIO platform represents the most significant technology development to occur in the global hospitality industry in the last 25 years." By implementing ATRIO to the property it is assumed that the service and financial goals will exceed expectations. Larry Hall, President & CEO of PAR Springer-Miller states "We look forward to the world coming to know Personality Hotels as an operator of some of the finest lifestyle properties in the world and the launch client for ATRIO, the platform that moved an industry." ATRIO will follow cloud computing which will bring significant financial benefit to Personality Hotels "Deploying ATRIO in the cloud helped reduce our implementation costs considerably," said Lembi-Detert President & CEO of Personality Hotels.

As most customers are supporting the green movement hoteliers had the need of applying green practices in their properties to attract potential clients. That is the case of Hilton Hotels such as the Strater and The Double Tree. "The Doubletree has been listed at the silver level by Green Seal, a nonprofit, third-party certifier in Washington, D.C. The Strater has been designated as meeting Energy Star standards set by the Environmental Protection Agency." Nielsen the Director of Marketing and Sales and green team leader at the Double Tree explains how the hotel had worked rigorously to become Green Seal certificated. Among the green practices that take place in the Double Tree as well as in The Strater are " recycling, energy efficiency, elimination of chemicals and the hotel had word volatile organic compounds, low-flow showers, toilets and sinks, and contracting with suppliers whose business practices are shades of green." The hotel also takes left over food and amenities to different organizations. With the implementation of the green practices the hotel has saved 26 percent on its energy costs by having lights with timers in low occupancy areas, low energy bulbs in offices and halls, and energy efficient lighting in guest rooms and restaurants.

As most customers are supporting the green movement hoteliers had the need of applying green practices in their properties to attract potential clients. That is the case of Hilton Hotels such as the Strater and The Double Tree. "The Doubletree has been listed at the silver level by Green Seal, a nonprofit, third-party certifier in Washington, D.C. The Strater has been designated as meeting Energy Star standards set by the Environmental Protection Agency." Nielsen the Director of Marketing and Sales and green team leader at the Double Tree explains how the hotel had worked rigorously to become Green Seal certificated. Among the green practices that take place in the Double Tree as well as in The Strater are " recycling, energy efficiency, elimination of chemicals and the hotel had word volatile organic compounds, low-flow showers, toilets and sinks, and contracting with suppliers whose business practices are shades of green." The hotel also takes left over food and amenities to different organizations. With the implementation of the green practices the hotel has saved 26 percent on its energy costs by having lights with timers in low occupancy areas, low energy bulbs in offices and halls, and energy efficient lighting in guest rooms and restaurants.

The article states that future Revenue Managers must be very tenacious in balancing the power of technology and managing the data process. With the advances of technology, social networking, e-commerce, online travel agencies, and mobile technology e-business have a great impact in our industry. Mourier claims "Already schooled in the way in which mobile has radically altered the air travel booking and in-flight entertainment experience, hotels guests are using everything from social media to online travel agents, (OTAs) to seek out and locate the best value." With the influence of social media, e-commerce, and travel review sites such as tripadvisor, Revenue Managers have to consider the impact those have in their businesses. Revenue managers need to understand what drives potential customers to stay in their hotels. The future Revenue Manager should possesses technological skills, understand the global market conditions, advances in technology, being cost effective, understand the importance of overall package deals and incentives, familiarize himself with the great impact of social media and advances in technology. "What's the cost-benefit analysis of launching a mobile-enabled web page versus an app and is having both redundant? Admittedly, there's no single answer to these questions and no one size fits all so the sooner RMs and hotel executives begin this conversation, the better," and have great leadership skills. It is really important that hotel managers understand that in todays' world technology can be a competitive advantage of their hotels if the use it adequately.

The agency "Tourism Fiji" will be implementing a new global brand and accompanying communications style, which would take place in each of the Tourism Fiji's international and local markets. This decision was based in accordance of the destination marketing audit of 2011. "A key outcome of that analysis was that taking a global approach to brand communications would create a range of new opportunities and help to ensure Tourism Fiji a maximum return on its marketing investments." The Tourism Fiji agency have received great ideas and proposals of agencies that are very interested in working with them because it will give them an opportunity to make their name known in the industry. These agencies are required to make a full pitch encompassing a full creative and strategic proposal. Michael Meade, acting chief executive officer of Tourism Fiji, claims "the association had already had strong levels of interest from the industry, despite only announcing the pitch on 24 January." Thanks to its communication campaigns, marketing strategies and networking, Tourism Fiji will attract great interest in new markets which will bring a lot of businesses to the agency.

With the advances of technology organizations can create a competitive advange by implementing them to their services and products. In the past companies were looking for remote desktop software solutions such as "VDI and Citrix to hardware solutions like Clear Cube and HP. Now with OnLive Virtual Desktop which is a full window and office desktop shows how technology has advanced very rapidly in the last couple of years making easier the use of systems "The service has been in use for the last year and while I've seen issues in hotels and areas with older or bottlenecked networks, in homes with high-bandwidth connections or businesses with well managed networks it has worked well - granted with few people on OnLive." Some companies would like to apply the advantage of Kinect which is a motion interface for Xbox designed to play without a controller. With Windows Kinect will make more comfortable to managers and directors giving presentations without the need of a keyboard or mice. Windows 8 will allow users to control a computer cursor with their eyes. "These technologies could, using different vectors, address usage models for PCs that have been unsafe or impossible before now and better allow existing hardware to use Microsoft's next operating system." With the implementation of water Block ( HzO) applied during manufacturing hardware would be more protected " Given that moisture is often what causes electronics to corrode and decay over time these solutions could be the equivalent of a Fountain of Youth, significantly extending the useful life of hardware that operates in moist or humid environments." This new advances in technology can bring to organizations more opportunities to expand their market, obtain a competitive advantage and protect their assets.

With the advances of technology organizations can create a competitive advange by implementing them to their services and products. In the past companies were looking for remote desktop software solutions such as "VDI and Citrix to hardware solutions like Clear Cube and HP. Now with OnLive Virtual Desktop which is a full window and office desktop shows how technology has advanced very rapidly in the last couple of years making easier the use of systems "The service has been in use for the last year and while I've seen issues in hotels and areas with older or bottlenecked networks, in homes with high-bandwidth connections or businesses with well managed networks it has worked well - granted with few people on OnLive."
Some companies would like to apply the advantage of Kinect which is a motion interface for Xbox designed to play without a controller. With Windows Kinect will make more comfortable to managers and directors giving presentations without the need of a keyboard or mice. Windows 8 will allow users to control a computer cursor with their eyes.
"These technologies could, using different vectors, address usage models for PCs that have been unsafe or impossible before now and better allow existing hardware to use Microsoft's next operating system."

With the implementation of water Block ( HzO) applied during manufacturing hardware would be more protected " Given that moisture is often what causes electronics to corrode and decay over time these solutions could be the equivalent of a Fountain of Youth, significantly extending the useful life of hardware that operates in moist or humid environments." This new advances in technology can bring to organizations more opportunities to expand their market, obtain a competitive advantage and protect their assets.