As a conference moderator, you could say it is a better problem to have to shut the panel up because they can’t stop talking, then to have to continually goad them to say more.
Yeoh moderated a lively panel on the impact of new technology.
The former of which is precisely what Yeoh Siew Hoon, founder & editor of Web In Travel (WIT), had to contend with as a moderator of the Cloud9 track on airline distribution and selling at CAPA’s Australia Pacific Aviation & Corporate Travel Summit 2017 held in Sydney this week.
The executive panel on hot new technology driving irreversible change in airline distribution, marketing, loyalty and technology obviously had more to say than time would allow them to.
So even after Yeoh had stepped off the stage to take questions from the floor, the panelists were still eagerly trying to get ideas across and last words in.
Several contentious points were raised that saw the panellists argue over the death of travel agents, the growing power of gatekeepers, the inherent dangers in the rise of voice and the fact that airlines weren’t very good at retailing still.
But let’s start with the obvious question of what hot new technology was consuming most of them these days.
“NDC will see tremendous movement in 2018” – Heywood
Ian Heywood, Global Head of Product & Marketing at Travelport, picked NDC (New Distribution Capability) which he said would see “tremendous movement in 2018” while James Marshall, Expedia’s vice president, Transport Partner Services, APAC singled out speed given how short attention spans were getting. “We are spending a lot of investment and effort into speed.”
For Charlie Sultan, Concur’s senior vice president of Supplier Management), it’s about how to get corporate travel data on one platform regardless of where travel was booked while David Peller, director strategic partnerships, Asia Pacific at Booking.com, singled out experimenting, testing and learning – “the small steps that matter”.
The evolution of marketplaces is clearly a fixation of Nati Harpaz, CEO, Catch Group, Australia’s largest
Harpaz sees more control for suppliers in marketplaces.
marketplace, who sees a future “where more control is given to suppliers and marketplace owners don’t get to control price”.
Control was clearly a word in Harpaz’ mind when he warned that the emergence of voice in search – Google’s Eugenia Lam in her earlier presentation had said between 20% and 30% of searches in the US were taking place via Google Home – would allow gatekeepers to control the choices consumers see.
He feared it would not be a democratic future because the nature of voice meant you needed a more filtered search which meant search giants could surface results which favoured them.
Marshall said that Expedia was also experimenting with voice but “it’s very early stages still”.
The first bone of contention was between Harpaz and Peller when the former said that airlines still had to get retailing right and could learn from marketplaces and Peller rebutted that “with all due respect, some airlines are actually doing it very well”, citing airlines were investing in digital and data and making the right moves. See related story – Jetstar’s bets on digital data 4 years ago paying off.
Then when Heywood dismissed the notion that “two men in a garage” could disrupt aviation in any big way, Harpaz countered with “I think when the founders of Amazon started all those years ago, people dismissed them and look what’s happened”.
Harpaz, whose company has launched a curated luxury travel business called Bon Voyage to complement its travel and leisure business, Scoopon Travel, which targets budget travellers, also sounded the death knell for traditional travel agents, which raised the heckles of Heywood, who shrugged and said this had been said before and traditional travel agents will adapt and survive.
While many agree this is not a new declaration, Harpaz was insistent, saying it’s a question of timing and all the factors, including next generational behaviour, are now in place to make it happen, even in Australia where traditional travel agents still hold sway.
“The forces are in place, my children will never go to a travel agent,” he said.
As for what they think will be game changers for aviation, Heywood stuck to his groove, NDC; Peller and Marshall said, “when airlines focus on revenues, not costs” and Harpaz said, “When personalisation finally happens.”
