Google’s Heckmann on how machine learning will Translate to better travel and how Asia is setting pace in mobile
Ahead of his speaking on the WIT Main Stage on Tuesday, October 24, Oliver Heckmann, Vice President, Engineering for Travel and Shopping, Google, shares what's top of his mind on how new technology such machine learning/AI and voice can make better travel.
Q: As you get set for to speak at WI [...]
Letter from Hong Kong: From real estate to community, from brick to clicks, can hospitality make the leap?
The sky is piercingly blue, as blue as it could only get after a huge storm has just whipped through. I am in Hong Kong two days after the last Typhoon 8 visited this city built on a rock.
At the Hotel Investment Conference Asia Pacific (HICAP), I heard a panel of investors saying perhaps [...]
Tech should make Better Travel for everyone, with disabilities you can or cannot see
What’s your disability? Because as far as clinical psychologist Nicky Abdinor, born without arms and shortened legs, is concerned, “everyone has a disability, it’s just that you can see mine”.
And perhaps disabilities you can see versus those that aren’t visible may be easier to deal wi [...]
Letter from Muscat: And so we enter the golden age of digital travel in Middle East
For some reason, Muscat seems closer in my mind than it really is. To get here, I had to connect via Dubai and with a four-hour layover, it’s almost a 12-hour journey and I thought I could have flown to London in that time.
But returning to Oman eight years later was what I wanted to do. After [...]
Thought leaders, disruptors to gather in Singapore for travel forum sharing ideas on Better Travel
In less than two weeks, the bigwigs of the travel industry and up-and-coming disruptors will gather in Singapore for a three-day conference to cultivate ideas and ponder new ways to improve the travel experience.
Some 500 delegates are expected to attend the conference that will run from [...]
Hoteliers must prepare for new wave of challenges in increasingly dynamic marketplace
Hotels must find ways to optimise their pricing and distribution in a marketplace that is continually under pressure from new entrants and new technology.
One of the industry’s front runner in revenue management is organising its third presentation of a revenue strategy forum, this year in Hong [...]
Letter from Sydney: Winter’s coming, a battle of Amazonic proportions is looming
Winter in Sydney is very different from the winter portrayed in the Game of Thrones television series but I get the feeling that the competition for online consumers is going to get as brutal and bloody in the next year or so, and travel will be caught up in the quest for the Iron Throne.
The [...]
Jetstar’s bets on digital, data 4 years ago paying off
Jayne Hrdlicka, CEO of Jetstar Group, painted a picture as sunny as the weather outside for her airline at this week’s CAPA Aviation Summit in Sydney.
Opening the two-day conference, she said, “The global economy is in its best shape since the GFC. We are carrying 37 million passengers now, t [...]
Startups in ASEAN: Time to look to China, not US, for lessons
If there was one clear message coming out from investors in the tech space at the Techsauce Global Summit in Bangkok last week, it was – it’s time for startups in Southeast Asia to stop looking to the US for role models; instead they should look to China.
A panel of investors, specialising in [...]
Letter from Kuching: Lessons for small earthlings in second cities
Just returned from Kuching and on the AirAsia flight to Singapore, I was reflecting on how the combination of low cost airlines and the web, specifically social media, has changed the fortunes and aspirations of folks living in second cities in Asia.
I hail from a secondary city myself, Penang, a [...]
