HOSPITALITY TRENDS
Olo Inc., | February 13, 2023
Olo Inc., a renowned open SaaS platform for restaurants that facilitates hospitality at every guest touchpoint, recently announced the availability of Borderless functionality for all customers of Olo Pay. This unlocks the advantages of streamlined payment across a larger set of 600 brands in Olo's network to improve the checkout experience for guests. This feature and several other product innovations are now available to aid its restaurant clients in providing superior hospitality.
Borderless, which was offered only to customers using Olo Pay's white-label interface Serve, is now available to all Olo Pay customers, including those with custom ordering websites and apps, allowing more brands to increase revenue and gain actionable guest data. For example, its capabilities eliminate the need for guests to remember passwords or enter credit card information at every transaction, simplifying the checkout process. It also lets restaurants increase guest retention, basket conversion, and visit frequency, improves the guest experience and de-identifies guest data to guide high-level business decisions.
Olo also introduced QR Code Ordering and Geolocation Partner Notifications this quarter. The new QR code ordering capability lets guests update their table numbers quickly and easily from their mobile device, allowing them to dine where they want and connecting guests to servers, thereby enhancing on-premises dining.
Expo, Olo's tablet-based software solution for restaurant front-of-house workflow, now displays guest arrival and approaching notifications for restaurants using Geolocation Partner Notifications. The feature's automation solves the need for multiple tablets and facilitates quick and fresh food preparation for guests.
About Olo
New York-basedOlo is a major on-demand commerce platform driving the digital transformation of the restaurant industry. The platform provides the infrastructure to capture consumer demand and manage orders across all channels. Through integrations with over 300 technology partners, its customers can create digital experiences with the industry's most robust and adaptable restaurant commerce ecosystem. Over 500 restaurant brands utilize Olo to increase digital sales, maximize profitability, and maintain direct customer relationships.
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TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY, AIRLINES AND AIRPORTS
Breeze Airways | February 10, 2023
On February 09, 2023, Breeze Airways, a domestic airline, announced that it now works as a launch customer for Staqpay, an incentive-based online checkout platform, to offer additional rewards over payments with brands that customers desire.
This mutually beneficial online payment platform will reward Breeze customers with more than 50% BreezePoints on the base fare by selecting StaqPay, whether through ACH, credit, debit, or cryptocurrency, at checkout. In addition, it also benefits the merchants by saving them a considerable amount of money compared to any other typical payment processor.
StaqPay is a financial technology company offering digital payment solutions and money transfers within money collection services, disbursements, and e-wallets. It has the support of institutional investors like Pelion Venture Partners, Peterson Ventures, and Kickstart Seed Fund and the license of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).
Breeze Chief Commercial Officer, Lukas Johnson, said, "This is just a nice solution all the way around because it gives us the ability to reward our Guests while saving Breeze money on merchant fees. By helping reduce costs, StaqPay is supporting us in our mission of providing our special brand of high-flex, low-fare service. It's truly a win-win."
(Source – Business Wire)
StaqPay President and Chief Technology Officer Dee Evans said, "I can't think of a better launch customer for StaqPay than Breeze. Just as Breeze disrupted its industry by creating an entirely new category of air travel, StaqPay is similarly disrupting the online payments world by offering a new and innovative solution built to benefit both businesses and their customers."
(Source – Business Wire)
About Breeze Airways
Breeze Airways, an airline and aviation company, offers flights over about 121 nonstop routes between approximately 35 cities in 20 states. Since 2021, it has provided low-cost flights between secondary airports while avoiding hubs for faster travel. In addition, it gives booking, no change or cancellation fees, and about 24 months of redeemable flight credits with complimentary family seating through simple application interactions. It was named the second-best domestic airline in the United States by "Travel + Leisure World's Best Awards." It operates a fleet of Airbus A220-300 and Embraer 190/195 aircraft. Aviation entrepreneur David Neeleman founded it in Salt Lake City, Utah
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TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY
RetailMeNot | February 27, 2023
Trip.com, an international travel services provider, has recently launched its solution TripGen, offering live travel assistance with chatbot-designed AI technology. The solution provides customized options for travel routes, travel booking recommendations and itineraries in real-time on the Trip.com platform.
It offers all the solutions needed for safe travel in one application, making it more accessible and customer friendly. Trip.com is committed to giving personalized all-inclusive search solutions for the best hotels, flights, hotels, and travel guides according to the traveler's desires. Furthermore, with the integration of an advanced context-based Natural Language Processing (NLP) chatbot, it extends its search capability.
This feature responds with exact answers to the user's vague and complex questions. It quickly suggests recommendations to any fragmented travel-related questions related to pre-trip decisions and in-trip arrangements. It also helps travelers at any stage of their travel, from arranging flights and hotels to tours and transportation, making the whole process stress-free.
COO of Trip.com, Schubert Lou said,"The goal of Trip.com is to become your trusted trip companion. The release of TripGen provides real-time, question-and-answer services in the Trip.com app, resulting in greater, faster, and more diverse support for the traveler". He added, "TripGen currently supports English, Japanese, Korean and traditional Chinese. More languages will be added depending on user needs. On the technical side, TripGen has integrated the OpenAI API, which developed ChatGPT based on GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer) architecture. In the future, we will consider other NLP model alternatives and continue on our journey to provide the ultimate product experience for the traveler.
(Source – Cision PR Newswire)
About Trip.com
Headquartered in Singapore, Trip.com, a global online travel agency, offers services for flights tickets, hotels booking, train tickets, and the internet. It enhances the travel experience from a short trip to a nearby city to a long adventure across the continent, helping travelers at every step of the journey. It has connected about 1.2 million hotels and over 500 airlines in approximately 200 countries to travelers. With a committed customer service team, it offers services non-stop 24/7 and assists travelers worldwide. It also provides an all-in-one travel application with features like trip coins, app-inclusive deals, easy trip planning, the latest travel updates, and worldwide coverage.
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