“Don’t build zombie companies,” Thayer’s Hemmeter advises startups
Specialist travel investor sees “bloody battle” ahead as AI plays out in the changing of search and engagement
AI or no AI, new tech or old tech, teams still make all the difference between success and failure in a startup, said Chris Hemmeter, c0-founder and managing director of Thayer Venture [...]
The quandaries humans in travel tech face in their journey towards AI La La Land
From getting away from “curse of the search box”, to reimagining user interfaces, and delivering on the “AI Agent Era”, human revolution needed to answer the hard questions AI is posing. And no, AI does not have the answer.
Both a human revolution is needed amid the technology revolut [...]
Starlink in Bali. Flying with Meta. Skyscanner gets Savvy. Virtual pink soup. More.
A star is born in Bali.
Starlink is coming to Bali – a move that will no doubt delight the island’s global nomads and tech entrepreneurs – although whether they will fork out the extra dollars for the Starlink service rather than stick with local Internet providers remains to be seen.
Elon [...]
Bangkok bike-hailing. Expensify’s chat super app. Token answer for busy airports. More.
Travel search on the cusp of a new era
Speaking at Arabian Travel Market (ATM) this week in a session on “How To Build Influence with Gen Z in Just 30 Seconds”, Marc-Antoine Simon, industry manager, Travel and Tourism – MENA, TikTok, shared insights on the latest trends in community-led marke [...]
Global Startup Pitch returns with new format
The Global Startup Pitch, by WiT, Phocuswright and PhocusWire, is back for the third year running in its quest to unearth the brightest stars on the gleaming edge of travel tech.
Welcoming both travel and non-travel startups who believe their businesses have application in the industry, the compe [...]
With 213% growth in transactions, record 2023 for Holibob on track to be broken
Company’s growth already accelerating in 2024 driven by its focus on online travel sellers and tourism boards
Holibob, the B2B2C provider of tours & experiences technology to online travel sellers and tourism boards, has confirmed that it saw record growth in 2023 and provided an update on th [...]
How an Indian techie, inspired by his first computer, is disrupting corporate travel
Building tech alone won’t make an impact, says company co-founder. Products must be business-first.
You’ve heard of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), but Travel-as-a-Service is a term uniquely coined by Spotnana – a service provider that calls itself a cocktail of ‘Online booking tool provider, [...]
Gamifying a storytelling product and redefining tours | Changemaker Chat
In this new WiT Studio video series, we catch up with winners of the 2023 WiT Travel Changemakers Awards, supported by ATTIA, and dive deeper into the work they do and what drove them to 'build back better'.
In this episode, Yock Song, Head of Partnerships at Tribe Tours, joins us to talk about [...]
Rewards take a hit. Quicktext and Velma speak your language. Cirium’s trendy data. More.
Reward points losing their power
If you think your airline reward points are losing their value, you would be right. The latest IdeaWorksCompany Reward Seat Availability Survey looked at the cost of points redemption across six US airlines - Alaska, American, Delta, JetBlue, Southwest, and Unit [...]
WiT Podcast: Creating customer love in tours and activities
How “the connected trip” is evolving in Booking.com and how Klook is solving local pain points
This final episode of “Customer Love” fittingly covers tours and activities – the things travellers do in destination. It’s the most exciting part of travel and it’s coming online at great s [...]
