News & Opinion

Big tech is winning using AI for destination experiences. The sightseeing sector needs to talk

October 18th, 2023 by Alex Bainbridge

Last week I went to the Arival conference in Orlando and I was surprised by the reaction to the content. Some tour operators were saying too much AI in the schedule. Well I have news for you, your upstream big tech partners are winning AI and you are not part of their plans. Tomorrows experience economy […]

Let’s get physical – comparing Viator, GetYourGuide & Google moving from digital to IRL

August 10th, 2023 by Alex Bainbridge

In the AI age, you can’t just be a digital service anymore. For the digital only companies this makes it a strategically important task deciding what to do beyond digital. This post is a quick summary of how Viator, GetYourGuide and Google are going physical with three different approaches. Not mutually exclusive of course, but […]

For and against rolling up reztech in 2023 – Checkfront / Rezdy

July 20th, 2023 by Alex Bainbridge

Depending upon your perspective, the big news this week was either the Checkfront / Rezdy shared ownership announcement, or Tripadvisor launching their AI tour itinerary generating service to consumers. Here is how both stories can be viewed from a singular perspective and are relevant to more than just suppliers who use Checkfront / Rezdy. But […]

GetYourGuide betting the haus on attractive unit economics

June 26th, 2023 by Alex Bainbridge

Along with GetYourGuide‘s recent funding announcements came some interesting leadership quotes that I just have to memorialise for future reference as their statements about unit economics and strategy are significant. Before we cover that, a clarification, GetYourGuide are not THE largest funded in our sector, the autonomous vehicle mobility platforms are funded far in excess […]

How decentralisation & AI will dominate the next decade and beyond in sightseeing

May 25th, 2023 by Alex Bainbridge

Too much AI debate in the sightseeing sector relates to generative AI such as text, image & video generation. This article outlines why we should prioritise addressing other forms of AI first, and how we can incorporate decentralised technology approaches within an overall AI strategy. First, why is everyone distracted by generative AI? I believe […]

How will the tourism industry structure change as a result of AI?

April 3rd, 2023 by Alex Bainbridge

As someone who has been working full time on the impact of AI on local tourism since early 2018 [Evidence], the last six months have seen some kind of vindication. However not everything I have foretold has come to pass, or at least not yet. And some of my approaches to hedge, or mitigate, the […]

The next four topics that need to be discussed about generative AI

March 13th, 2023 by Alex Bainbridge

Great to see so much discussion around generative AI at ITB Berlin last week. In particular I heard there was significant debate within the sightseeing & experiences sector, where generative AI is fundamentally a product innovation, as opposed to flights & hotels sectors where generative AI powers retail innovation. However several key topics remain undiscussed. […]

How San Francisco shapes the future of tourism and robotaxis

February 28th, 2023 by Alex Bainbridge

Publicly available autonomous vehicles (e.g. robotaxis) are here. My Autoura service is available (for early testing) operating tourism experiences in four US cities – San Francisco, Las Vegas, Austin & Phoenix, using publicly available robotaxis. We have no vehicles ourselves. I have been disappointed that the tour bus sector hasn’t grasped the incoming disruption that […]

What does technology innovation in sightseeing & experiences look like in 2023?

February 21st, 2023 by Alex Bainbridge

In the last couple of months there has been a whirlwind of tech news much of it lead by discussion about generative AI such as ChatGPT. But underneath all of that, innovators in our sector have begun to tentatively hint at what they are focussed on. Therefore it is worthwhile documenting what people have said, […]

Is forming a sightseeing industry DAO the only solution to AI centralisation?

January 25th, 2023 by Alex Bainbridge

Generative AI such as ChatGPT is an era defining technology and it merits the number of articles and videos created on this topic. However we are ignoring one core debate, we need to talk about what happens when this and related AI technologies scale, which they will. This article focusses on this important topic with […]