Aditya Sanghi, Co-founder and CEO of Hotelogix, talks about the role of technology in evolving the hospitality industry in the upcoming year

The hospitality industry is yet to get back its pre-COVID level spot. Hotels across the globe are witnessing fluctuating occupancy due to many uncertainties related to region-specific shutdowns, government-imposed regulations, and an increasing concern for health safety among guests.

For example, according to Amadeus’ Demand360 data, the global hotel occupancy stood at around 60 per cent in July 2021, almost double that of July 2020. However, the emergence of Omicron is again threatening to destabilise everything. In the face of such an ambiguous business environment, all the stakeholders - hotels and hospitality technology providers like us, have learned three most important lessons for sure:

* change is inevitable,

* the industry must adapt according to it,

* and technology must evolve to help hotels sail through the change. 

Talking about technology, according to Hospitality Technology’s 2021 Lodging Technology Study: Reimagining Hospitality, in 2020, hotels allocated around 4 per cent of their revenue towards the IT budget and 24 per cent of each dollar out of it went to implement new solutions. Keeping 2020’s turbulence in mind, many industry professionals like me are looking at this step towards IT adoption with much optimism. 

Now, let’s look at a few critical technology solutions that have helped hotels navigate the muddy waters in 2021 and will help them stay strong in 2022.

Increasing adoption of cloud-based multi-property management solution

This is one of the biggest trends in terms of enterprise-grade software adoption, like a comprehensive, all-in-one cloud-based Hotel PMS. Two reasons mainly drove this. First – many chain brands increased their portfolio by acquiring standalone properties that couldn’t withstand the impact of the pandemic. Second – most chain or group hotels realised that a robust cloud Hotel PMS is the only way to ensure success in 2022 and beyond with 360-degree hotel operations and centralised control.

Our close observation reveals that over 50 per cent of hoteliers, from 2020 to 2021, upgraded to cloud Hotel PMS. It’s not only us, but even Hospitality Technology’s 2021 Lodging Technology Study indicates that 34 per cent of hoteliers embraced enterprise software for efficient property management. And why not? After all, a full-featured Hotel PMS can help chain hotels gain mobility along with automated and streamlined operation, seamless POS management, online distribution, revenue management, online reputation management, group-wide reports, compliance and data security, and central reservation, etc.

Before the pandemic, chain hotels were unsure about migrating to the cloud. Even though they clearly understood the value propositions that cloud offers, they couldn’t ditch their on-premises solutions given the significant investment that they had already made. However, the pandemic related slowdown and associated changes related to their daily operations and guest preferences made them do the right thing at the right time.

Touchless technology

The demand for touchless technology is driven by the guests’ need to ensure health safety during their stay. When we tried to probe this matter a little by talking to hoteliers across regions, we found that all their guests (100 per cent) first enquire about the availability of one or more such services.

Whether making reservations, selecting rooms, checking in, unlocking the door, controlling in-room facilities, raising requests/complaints, paying bills, or checking out, today’s guests want a “touchless” experience in every aspect of their interaction with hotels. They want to use their smartphones to do everything. Our clients and prospects say that over 90 per cent of their guests would love to use their smartphones to manage check-in, keyless entry, in-room amenities, payment, and check out.

I believe that this trend will continue to influence the guests’ booking decisions, plus the way hotels will be looking at implementing the right technology. In this context, to stay relevant and attractive, over 90 per cent of hoteliers that we know plan to reduce physical touchpoints at their properties by 2022.

2022 and beyond

Our analysis discovers that around 65 to 70 per cent of hoteliers are expecting to achieve pre-pandemic level stability by 2022, and as their technology partner, we will continue supporting them in every possible way. In fact, it’s not only us at Hotelogix, but every other hospitality technology solution provider will also do what it takes to accelerate the industry’s recovery process in 2022.