IRVING, TX—Being an organization built with the expressed purpose of continually looking long-term and helping the hotel industry evolve through customer-centric, technological innovation, Hotel Technology Next Generation naturally has to maintain a focus beyond the up-and-down market dynamics affecting the industry on a daily basis. But try as it might at its North American Members’ Meeting and Conference here, HTNG could not avoid the pervasive subject of the economic recession and how it, unlike perhaps previous macro-economic shifts, will now affect advances in hotel technology moving forward.
To HTNG’s credit and its executive vp and CEO, Douglas Rice, the organization voluntarily waded into the muck and mire of the recession by having the event’s closing chief information officers session tackle the subject head on following more typical and optimistic thought leadership sessions on such cutting-edge topics as cloud computing and Internet Protocol version six. And to the CIOs’ credit, none seemed in any way downtrodden by the economy and its effects on their companies, signaling that technological advances and aspirations will not soon be rendered financially superfluous.
Moderating the economic panel at the Omni Mandalay Hotel at Las Colinas was Jon Inge, president of consultant firm Jon Inge & Associates, who noted with regard to the relationship between economic hardship and technology, “Fear can be a motivator. But fear can also lead to other bad decisions.”
Presiding over their companies’ technology decisions and representing the economic session’s panelists were Vineet Gupta, senior vp of technology at Fairmont Raffles Hotels International; Paula Winkler, executive vp and CIO of Carlson Hotels Worldwide; Jeremy Ward, senior vp of information technology at European hotel management firm Kempinski Hotels; and Todd Thompson, CIO of Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc., who also took over as president of HTNG during this year’s conference following the retirement of former Marriott International Chief Technology Officer Barry Shuler.
In giving HTNG conference attendees a glimpse of how the recession has affected Starwood from a technological perspective, Thompson explained, “We’ve done what you would expect [in a recession]. We have [return on investment]-based assessments of what’s needed and strategic to the company. So we’re continuing with our [customer relationship management]initiatives and the replacement of our central reservations system, which we’re wrapping up now. Ultimately, it’s all to increase our guest satisfaction index.”
At Carlson, Winkler noted that while the firm’s being conservative with its budget in 2009, it will spend money on its overall technology infrastructure, including its CRS, while shifting from an in-house data center to a third-party-hosted one. “We’re also going to move one of our brands to a centrally hosted [property management system]. The object is to get all of our hotels on a common PMS. And we’re always enhancing our revenue optimization for all our hotels,” she added, while also mentioning this was her first HTNG conference and that Carlson plans on playing a larger role in the organization.
Also a relative newcomer to HTNG is Gupta, who joined the organization last fall. With regard to Fairmont’s technology strategy as it relates to the recession, he noted the budget is still intact for now, but that’s on a month-to-month basis. Even so, Fairmont is looking to derive value out of its technology initiatives, and so he pointed out, “We think the value now is in the guest-facing applications and in-room technology. So we’ll focus on that. CRM is also key for us with more revenue generation being the goal.”
Ward also echoed Gupta’s statement about the importance of guest-facing today and how it can actually help maintain operating performance. “We’re trying to protect rate while taking an occupancy hit. And we’re trying to protect rate via the guest technology experience,” he said of Kempinski Hotels. “We feel this is crucial in this market and for our five-star, upper upscale hotels. We haven’t done this well before but we’re trying to make the experience better. We’re trying to drive guests back with our technology, which will help keep the rates up.
“Now, in our development projects, our owners are trying to cut technology costs by having just one CAT6 line, for example,” he continued. “We’re trying to tell them they need to take technology to the next level for the guest experience and that will maintain the rate. Cutting costs will only hurt them in the future.”
Ward also remarked that like other hotel technology departments in this economy, Kempinski’s still must maintain a “five-year view” and not a short-term one “while remaining realistic in its support of its hotel projects.”
At the same time, HTNG hopes to play a part in helping hotel companies like Kempinski and the industry at large improve their operating efficiencies and performance via technology in this recession. And while that may not be the comprehensive cure-all for such macro-economic challenges, it’s at least a starting point, according to Thompson. “The state of the industry is that there is significant pressure on costs and changes are required,” he said in concluding the conference. “And change will require collaboration throughout the industry and HTNG will make sure that happens through its technology initiatives. Five years from now we’ll remember this conference and this economy and we’ll recognize that HTNG was well-positioned to take us through this time.”
