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This article discusses the controversial self-checkout model in major chain stores such as Target and Walmart and the cause and effect of labor issues and how other scenarios appear to be encouraging a time when this model replaces human checkout entirely. It was reported that Walmart loses 3 billion every year to customer and employee theft. For the most part, retailers have been thinking about self-checkout through a financial-savings and customer-experience perspective. But inherently, that means there's going to be less eyes on a transaction, less human interaction and more opportunity for shrink.

This article expounds how important the speed of IT is in order to effectively balance business value, risks, and technical feasibility. The article continues to explain how the speed of IT should be as fast as possible unlike traditional single-speed delivery models that work well for high-torque enterprise operations did not work well for high-speed innovation. According to the article, a growing number of CIOs realize that projects often require additional gears that meet their specific needs and cadences. With investments in foundational and flexible procedural, architectural, and organizational domains, right-speed IT can help turn simplistic models and philosophical discussions into concrete value. In conclusion, CIOs are finding a balance between high torque enterprise IT and high-speed innovation IT can allow companies to optimize technology operations.

This article is about the current rise in the use of the GDS system again. This rise has been seen primarily with corporate travelers, but has also been used by the leisure traveler. While GDS usage percents dropped from 98% in 1999 to 79% in 2009, it has slightly started to increase again. Sabre one of the larger GDS companies has seen a 7% increase in use of the system in 2012. Hotels have tried to give companies better rates to their consumers, for example as more corporate travelers are extending their stays from a business trip and then turning it into a leisure trip for a few more days. This gives the traveler a lower rate a night at the hotel, as they are staying for more nights. Overall, while there was a decline in the use of GDS because of the OTA, there is now a slight increase, bringing life back to the GDS system.

This article gives an in depth explanation of the importance of GDS's in the hotel industry and the increased usage of the GDS due to the rising travel demand. The American Society of Travel Agents conducted a study in 2009 and found the percentage of member travel agencies that used the GDS declined from 98% in 1999 to 79% in 2009. A significant portion of the decrease was due to the economic downturn, but regardless hoteliers and travels still found value is the GDS channel. According to Sabre Travel Network, there was an increase of more than 7% in GDS bookings during the first quarter of 2012 over the same period last year. The demand for corporate travel is the main reason for the increase. Many people that are traveling for business want to extend their trips for leisure. This allows hotels the opportunity to adjust their pricing strategies by putting travel promotions for leisure for the business travels as well. Many people utilize the GDS to find the most affordable prices, but it is also beneficial to hoteliers as well. Elaine Kennedy, one of the two interviewed in the article, stated the pricing model provides corporations with a lower rate when demand decreases but also gives hoteliers the opportunity to achieve higher rates when demand increases, which ultimately is a win-win for both sides. The GDS also provides many opportunities for hotels to cut costs. Robert Cole, the other person interviewed in this article, stated "The GDS also provides enhanced marketing support….immediately when you use the GDS to put your product, your service, your room, your rate, you're getting it in front of an audience without using your own marketing budget." According to Robert Cole, the GDS is not going away any time soon because of the unique solutions it provides for hotels and travelers alike. I believe this article was very informative on how the GDS is currently being utilized and where it is going in the future. It basically helped answer question 3

In 2007, in the last round of GDS negotiations; American Airlines and Delta Airlines warned that they will pull out Of major GDS if they didn't get to have their way. American Airlines threaten once again to pull out, due to other airlines pushing messages; stating that "the airline-GDS business model is broken and must change, leading up to negotiations next year". GDS seems to spite airlines by lowering the travel agents incentive fees, because the airlines lowered their fee that they pay out to GDS that year. JetBlue's vice president mentioned how much the industry took baby steps in the last sets of negotiation. There is a disturbance between the travel agents and JetBlue, in this situation. JetBlue was making profits off GDS, but at the same time GDS is releasing flight seats to travel agents; that don't need help to be filled. Therefore travel agents are making more profits because they are receiving these seats at a higher distribution cost. There are also concerns among the airlines about the GDS financial model that have been broken, and needed to be fixed. The engineer that is over this, stated that it will be fined tuned; and things will adjust. My observation with this entire article is that the airlines that were mentioned are money hungry, and competitive with wanting their own way. They are concerned about the GDS; because travel agents are reaping many benefits that they think only should be offered to them in regards to the distribution cost. It seems, like the airlines just want to be in control of everything. They have to accept that many people purchase through third parties and don't directly go on their websites.

As mentioned in the article the GDS model should be examined based on current trend. American Airline now is directing clients to its direct connect site so all parties need to come together and negotiate in a way that will be beneficial to all including the consumer. It was interesting to read in the article that even though JetBlue is a low cost airline it saw benefit for corporate travelling through GDS.

This article emphasizes the importance of SaaS (Software as a Service) to the hospitality industry. This model allows companies to deliver services via the internet, thus decreasing the costs and the failure rate in the software services and the product distribution. This application is creating a new model of customer interaction and relationship building as the mobile usability is constantly increasing into the hotel and travel industry. The SaaS solution distributed via the internet eliminates the physical need for indirect distribution because it is not physically distributed and can be delivered almost instantaneously. This article talks about the impact that this system causes to the hotel's operation. This system can anticipate problems and proactively addresses and fixes the issues via the support and monitoring team that is immediately available investigating and rectifying the issues promptly. Among the many benefits that SaaS brings to the hotel's operations, one very important benefit is that the executive team can keep an eye on the operations and even make changes when they are off-property through cloud-based access. The SaaS implementations would give hoteliers more control on the relationship with their technology provider and SaaS gives this to them. I feel this program is really valuable for people in the hotel industry.

Events and event planning are evolving into new, dynamic formats. Old models are falling away and technology is giving both planners and event participants an opportunity to grow and revisit the underlying ideas about how event spaces work. "It's been fascinating watching just how fast things have changed," said Brian Solis, principal at Altimeter Group, at a New York conference this year.

This article talks about the ways that technology is changing event planning and events themselves. Event attendees are now looking for more engaged experiences, rather than the old way of merely attending an event passively. Social media plays a huge role in how attendees interact with and even plan an event. Participants can interact with and engage with event speakers now more than ever, with participants sending questions to the speaker via social media or other technology that allows for the speaker to answer audience questions in real time. Data personalization allows for event attendees to receive information about the event, allowing them to be involved in the planning process and during the event itself, whether it's through Bluetooth or geofencing technology. Event attendees can take advantage of augmented reality technology to engage in activities. Wearable technology is becoming increasingly popular, as it allows attendees to get information quickly and easily without any real input on the attendee's part. Mobile apps are now becoming more commonplace for events, as it's easy, efficient, and convenient. Drone technology is now being used at events, whether to take pictures or to stream the event to people who could not attend.

As the world has moved forward with technology, so to has the world of events and event planning. Planners are able to connect with the guests on a whole different level and events have the technology to be able to keep the attendees engaged and interacted. From flying drones to social media, technology has helped selling events a much easier process.

They can work together. Based on this article, this can be beneficial for all industries.

Robotics, virtual reality, and augmented reality can work together to create cutting-edge solutions for diverse businesses. Businesses use robots to increase efficiency while also ensuring employee safety in potentially dangerous situations. Virtual reality and augmented reality, two contemporary technologies, have provided an immersive platform for media and gaming. People can explore strange environments both indoors and outdoors with the aid of AR and VR. The "Three Amigos" can be augmented reality, robotics, and virtual reality when they work together. Robot control using immersive technologies like VR and AR is possible. Business executives need to be aware of the potential benefits of combining virtual reality, robots, and augmented reality. Robots can be programmed to do a variety of jobs using virtual reality and augmented reality. There are two different kinds of neural networks: imitation networks, which attempt to comprehend demonstrations and examine how actions are executed, and visual networks, which use images taken by the robot's camera to understand the current state of an object. Dual neural networks can be used by organizations to enable robots to learn new tasks by monitoring and dissecting several behaviors. Robots that use artificial intelligence (AI) are exposed to a wide variety of data, which helps them learn how to distinguish between distinct objects, group related objects together, and recognize new objects that resemble what they have already seen. The expense and effort needed to gather data and real-world items can be reduced by trainers and developers. Robots can also be taught to recognize certain biological structures in the human body using 3D models. Virtual reality can be utilized to construct teleoperating robots that can function with the help of many sensor displays by employing hand controllers. The homunculus concept of the human brain, which postulates that there is a miniature human inside the brain that controls movement

The article I chose is about the cloud. The cloud as its described in this article is a model of computing enabled by internet access that connects servers and networks to the public without the need to purchase large expensive equipment or staff to perform maintenance, and rather pay a monthly fee where this along with other services are performed. In this article we are given step by step instructions on the cloud computing environment and there five key characteristics. From internet access to measured service, on demand self-service, shared recourse pooling to rapid elasticity, the cloud encompasses many things and if you were like me, unsure of the what the cloud is and its functions, here is a is a step by step manual on the cloud and what it can do for you.

This GDS allows over 300 major airlines to get connected with thousands of points of Sale and this platform, consisted by only 3 major ticket distributors known as a GDS other than the airline website. Airlines are paying around $7 billion dollars per year for using GDSs. This is a huge amount and consumers have to pay this.  But at this moment, GDS is still needed as a neutral technology platform especially for small travel agencies.  

Chang, Great Post! Technology continues to advance daily, with new technological advances we will be able to book airline tickets different ways and the need for GDS will continue to reduce. Southwest Airlines has been able to maintain cost by the limited involvement the company has with GDS's. Hopefully by decreasing GDS's cost, we will be able to afford cheaper airlines tickets with other carriers (http://blog.compete.com/2011/01/26/american%E2%80%99s-gds-gamble/).

According to the article, different customers, business models and selling strategies require different sizes of CRM system. Over the years, vendors only added more and more features to original CRM systems. They've focused more on functionality at the system level, taking an everything-that-everyone-needs approach that rarely took into consideration the user's interaction with the CRM system. So businesses are demanding a much more flexible, much more nuanced interaction with the information in (and around) a CRM system, an interaction focused on the needs of the individual accessing the information and the needs of the customer engagement taking place. So clearly one size of CRM cannot fit all. Such as how iPhone changes the appearance & function of keyboards and screens. As CRM system focuses more on personal view, "smart" and "flexibility" may be what CRM should achieve in the future.

This article is a series of several blog contributions for successful emarketing on Hotels magazine's website. "Will the Hospitality Industry Tango with Tingo" discusses the introduction of Tingo.com, a new Online Travel Agent (OTA) website affiliated with Expedia.com that guarantees its' customers to refund the difference if the price booked for the room drops after booking. This sounds great right? While of great value to customers, especially those who are money conscious, the article explains that Tingo.com is another industry basher that ultimately makes hotels appear to be ripping their customers off. This type of marketing tool should be two fold- both industry and advertiser friendly and an OTA website such as Tingo.com will potentially strain its relationship with business in the hospitality industry sooner than later. Tripadvisor is pointed out as an example of a major hospitality industry resource that has damaged its reputation with hotels and is continuing to do so. An analysis of Tingo.com is presented including the evaluation of several factors Tingo.com does not consider under its business model. The article deems both Tripadvisor and Tingo.com as "confused and misguided." In conclusion, this article presents valid points that I have never considered prior to reading about the challenges and perception some hospitality industry leaders have. From the customer perspective, both Tripadvisor and Tingo are highly favored for obvious reasons but not consistently for hotels and restaurants.

This article summarizes how a particular advance in IT, specifically cloud technology, has made it easier for hotels to actually provide hospitality. By democratizing the industry-leading technology solutions, the cloud provides independent hoteliers with the ability to compete with their larger counterparts by increasing efficiencies. While the article identifies many of the general benefits of cloud technology that we have been discussing in class previously, such as uninterrupted access to business solutions and much lower hardware costs, it goes on to provide specific examples of how hotels can actually integrate software within the cloud to power their business. For example, revenue management solutions on the cloud often work on a pay-as-you-go model, not a subscription. This increases the number of connections that hotel revenue managers can make with OTAs, in turn driving conversion to actual bookings. Moreover, cloud-based revenue management solutions provide integrated software that decreases the need for a large revenue management staff. The article also cites the prevalence of mobile bookings, which are growing at 20% versus 2% for desktop bookings. More than a fifth of bookings are actually done using a mobile device. With all of this new consumer data, hotels can actually personalize their offerings for their guests. This will decrease generic advertising costs over time. The reason why it is important to take these mobile bookings into account is that mobile consumers are already connected to the cloud as they make these arrangements. With that in mind, hotels need to turn around and continue to push storage, advertising, and booking solutions on the cloud to meet this demand.

This article summarizes why we wont be seeing a decline of GDS use in the travel industry anytime soon. As stated in the article "nothing beats a GDS model for booking seats on planes". The article suggests that a good GDS agent can ultimately work more efficiently than someone working with a GUI. Another major positive to using GDS is accessibility. A firm can book both corporate and leisure travel from anywhere, as long as internet access is available. In one study 62% of agents said that air content was the biggest draw of a GDS. One agent said that when booking air the GDS system Amadeus gives her a selection of choices in a fraction of the time it takes her clients to see them online. Clearly, GDS systems such as Amadeus and Sabre are saving agents and customers time and money while booking. Another upside to using GDS is that it allows agents to see routes, departures and arrival times which are important because many clients have preferable airports when they travel. The article also says how GDS is more commonly used for air and car rentals instead of hotels. It also gives a look into why Airlines werent a fan of GDS usage. For example, GDS were changing revenue models for airlines because GDSs paid travel agents and it seemed that they were buying loyalty with money from airline fees.

This is an article about the 3 main GDS in the world and how GDS helps Travel agencies to grow more using an OTA model. It explains the importance of the GDS in the travel industry as well as the possible future for it.

Operators focus on cost, and this can prohibit the Operator from realizing the advantages and benefit of utilizing an RMS. When looking at an ROI they will often utilize Pacing data from a year over year perspective which is often, as the author puts it, asterisked. A simple explanation is the number of variables that can lead to impractical or flawed comparison such as mis-segmentation, unique events or otherwise. The author proposes instead that Operators should look at ROU, which roughly speaking takes market dynamics and most of the variables out of the equation. An ROU analysis (Revenue Uplift Opportunity) establishes a baseline measurement over a 90 day period that requires the establishment of two models (carbon copies) of the Hotel in question. The first, is a manual model that mimics the manual process of yielding and inventory management and overbooking, while the second utilizes the decision process of the installed or applied RMS. The author states that what Operator realize is the hidden maximization opportunity in both pricing and inventory controls based on manual processes reacting to demand conditions rather than anticipating. The value of this outside of the above application is how a KPI and a different manner of looking at the data can lead to valuable insight on what a real ROI can be. As an RM professional whom utilizes an advanced RMS on a regular basis it is sometimes it is difficult to see outside the box and perceive the value of the technology that is a mainstay in the Branded community. Being able to see the implications it can have for those not using or not having bought into the technology is actually a bit of a back step as it speaks to the value that this solution provides for the company.

Smart stadiums are growing in popularity around the world. In 2016 was estimated to be 4.62 million dollars and is expected to grow by just over 30% by 2021. There are different models available when designing a smart stadium. The on-demand deployment model will make up the largest share of the market. The leader in the growth of smart stadiums are Europe, Middle East, and Africa. There are six factors contributing to the growth of smart stadiums. However, there are two factors that are hindering the growth of smart stadiums. One of these factors is the investment. There are at least ten major corporations that are offering smart stadium solutions. Five of the ten corporations are based in the United States. However, there are some smaller companies that are forming partnerships to help stadiums implement the new technology.

This article addresses the French reparability index which is a relatively new implementation that started in January of 2021, It requires that reparability scores are posted on some major tech products in France in hopes of slowing down planned obsolescence and eliminating tech waste. France is the first country to implement such as mandate and it bringing to light the notion of planned obsolescence to the general public. This article shares some of the major tech brands scores and how they are fairing against their competition.

This article is about Virtual Restaurants, Ghost Kitchens, and the differences between the two. To be honest, I was not really familiar with either of these concepts before today, though I can see the appeal of both and why they are increasing in popularity. It's obvious that the pandemic played a large role in accelerating the popularity and significance of these kinds of services but I do not think things will slow down. It is evident that people like the ability to order a wide variety of food and get it in a timely manner while still retaining its quality. I think that ghost kitchens are a great opportunity for people to test out their restaurant concepts without committing to a long term lease, a large investment in equipment, etc. I think that it will lend to more diversity in delivery food and potentially even higher quality.

Ghost kitchens is such an interesting concept and the name just grabs you! I skimmed through this article and will definitely go back to properly read it once I have the brain capacity to do so haha. Judging from your review on it these are becoming popular and significant in our day in age.

This article is about how hospitality and tourism have been reshaped through IT, eMarketing and how it has helped prove sales, information, made destinations more popular and also help travelers plan. eMarketing also is a massive platform for word of mouth. This study also shows what helped eMarketing become what it is. When certain things are typed into search bars, this data is collected and used for eMakreting and to target specific groups of people.