Hospitality Net met Brian Reeves – the CEO and founder of roomangel Foundation – at HITEC to learn how AI has reshaped hotel distribution.
The roomangel Foundation is a non-profit organization that launched Hive, its first major initiative, to help hoteliers regain control over pricing and distribution. Hive is more than just an AI tool. It is the foundation for what Reeves refers to as the “diegetic” future.
What is Hive and how does it function?
Hive uses roomangel’s proprietary pricing data and integrates it into a fully AI native environment. Hoteliers can expect immediate improvements in performance while building a path to AI readiness. Reeves described Hive’s “performance layer”, which operates across revenue, marketing, finances, and distribution. The tool provides hoteliers with insights that are ready to use and can be shared, allowing them to create AI-powered tools to suit their specific needs.
What is the ‘diegetic future’?
Reeves believes that the future of travel bookings is defined by intelligent agents, AI powered bots working on behalf of consumers and hotels. This new paradigm requires hotels to be able to answer thousands of AI queries simultaneously. In order to do this, they need to optimise their pricing and performance data in order for them operate at machine speeds and with greater accuracy.
Reeves imagines a world where hoteliers, by leveraging their own data and platforms, like Hive, will outperform OTAs, gaining richer property-level insight and more accurate price data. Travellers want to “never overpay for hotel rooms” and roomangel’s data is the only way that the industry can fulfill this promise.
Achieving fragmentation and silos
The fragmentation of data and hotel operations was a recurring topic in the discussion. Reeves criticized the traditional model of departments operating in silos. Marketing, revenue management and finance all use disconnected systems. Hive wants to bridge the gap and allow seamless collaboration.
Many of us have tried to out-analyze our competitors using incomplete information
Reeves made the following comment: Hive lets users connect Google Analytics, benchmark the performance of their website, and get AI-powered suggestions to improve. All this is done on a single platform.
Is AI replacing people?
Reeves tackled the hard question: Is AI replacing humans? He was pragmatic and optimistic in his answer. He believes AI will replace humans in all industries. However, Hive’s aim is to help rather than replace. The platform is intended to improve the abilities of marketing managers, revenue teams and finance directors. This will allow for better decisions and better collaboration.
AI hype: Cutting through the hype
Reeves offered an honest assessment of the AI buzz that was permeating the conference. While many companies at HITEC claimed to offer AI, they were simply rebranding existing automation. Reeves believes that true AI is rare but crucial. He praised Cloudbeds and other companies for taking meaningful, rational steps in AI, but warned that many of the products on the market today are more fiction than functionality.
A special invitation to Hoteliers
Reeves finished with a call for action: Create a free Account It’s broken. Play with it. Add your data. Create something amazing with your data.
. He encouraged hoteliers not to see Hive as a threat but rather as an opportunity for the industry to shape a future that is rapidly approaching.
Reeves is clear about his position in an era when AI could consolidate the power of OTAs, or empower hotels to seize control.
Brian Reeves
CEO of roomangel
roomangel Foundation
