INTERNATIONAL REPORT—Whether it’s celebrating an anniversary, receiving an award, earning a certification, debuting a new product or expanding the business, hotel companies and vendors achieve new milestones on a daily basis. Here’s a look at recent accomplishments:
TraknProtect Launches TraknKleen App
TraknProtect has launched TraknKleen, a new IoT technology solution designed to help hotels further enhance housekeeping operations, while providing guests with security and peace of mind during post-COVID-19 travel. TraknKleen trilaterates data from multiple sources, such as housekeeping carts, ID cards, cleaning supplies and other assets, to automatically track the date, time and duration of the cleaning process for guestrooms and public areas in a hotel. The tool also uses multiple data points to help hotels assess and confirm compliance with established cleaning protocols, while also inspiring a higher level of trust for guests and hotel staff, according to the company.
TraknKleen is built on TraknProtect’s advanced IoT Platform, which includes electronic safety devices (ESDs) and can be seamlessly deployed using existing TraknProtect hubs or WAPs. Leveraging this existing technology, which keeps deployment costs for the solution low, the tool creates an audit trail for housekeeping activities, and tracks the use of designated cleaning assets, such as electrostatic sprayers in all guest areas. This allows properties using TraknKleen to share real-time access to relevant and reliable information regarding the organized and systemic delivery of property-based cleaning activities with corporate buyers, travelers and hotel brands.
To ensure data security, any and all personally identifiable information is stored anonymously for all housekeeping activities that are aggregated and reported, allowing housekeeping staff to use the solution confidently without being individually monitored. Collected data is analyzed over intermittent periods—for example, every three to four hours—and arranged in a manner such that no real-time tracking takes place.
ProfitSword Releases Wischermann Partners Case Study
ProfitSword has released a case study on the successful implementation of its business performance forecasting solution, ProfitSage, by Wischermann Partners. Specializing in managing upscale and luxury properties, Wischermann Partners sought out the expertise of ProfitSword in order to instantly gain real-time insight into the financial performance of each hotel or for the company as a whole.
An advanced reporting, budgeting and forecasting solution that is designed to automatically integrate with disparate data-generating systems such as a hotel’s PMS, POS and accounting software, ProfitSage provides Wischermann Partners with the ability to swiftly gain access to an array of vital business performance indicators in order to obtain real-time insight into the organization’s financial strength and outlook. This includes the ability to review labor statistics, prior expenses and upcoming financial commitments.
ProfitSword’s web-based applications addresses Wischermann Partners’ core data management and business intelligence needs by allowing users to effortlessly switch back-and-forth between reviewing performance analytics for individual properties or for the entire company. This includes being able to more seamlessly and quickly compile daily, weekly, and month-end financial and performance metrics and reports on demand.
Routier Joins Volara’s Voice Integration Hub
Routier, an omni-channel hotel guest engagement solution that uses messaging channels to seamlessly connect guests to staff, has joined Volara’s secure voice integration hub. By combining Volara’s conversation-management software with Routier’s guest-facing engagement solution, hotels will expedite two-way contactless communications between guests and staff, thereby bridging the gap between voice and text. Guests speak requests to smart speakers with voice assistants powered by Volara and receive replies, updates and more via Routier’s guest MessageHub.
Routier’s MessageHub personalizes the guest experience and ensures a higher level of engagement and utilization, eliminating language barriers and driving positive interactions with the property, according to the company. Keeping all communications in one channel also makes it easy for hoteliers to track and efficiently interact with all guest conversations, from service requests, notifications and upsell offers, to reservations and complaint resolution. Using artificial intelligence-based technology, the solution automatically answers guests’ questions, takes requests, manages complaints and makes recommendations, thereby freeing up hotel staff and delivering operational efficiencies.
By establishing a centralized messaging hub, all conversations with guests, via all messaging platforms, are carried out in one, easily trackable thread, eliminating communication silos. This frictionless solution streamlines staff task management as well, allowing the property to quickly identify any issues that can be resolved and tracked in real time, while the guest is still on-property and before they post reviews. Guest requests can be routed through a call center and attached to a service ticket, saving valuable staff time and expediting resolution for the guest.
Ideas and SIHOT Partner to Increase Operational Effectiveness
Ideas has formed a new technology partnership with SIHOT. The two-way data integration between Ideas’ revenue management solutions and SIHOT’s property management software, SIHOT.PMS, will help the global hotel industry accurately forecast business demand, maximize occupancy and ADR and increase overall operational effectiveness through automated pricing decisions, according to the company.
Continuous innovation from SIHOT and Ideas provides a sophisticated two-way integration that enables hotels to better leverage revenue optimization and operational performance and delivers a powerful data exchange that enhances both technologies.
The integration utilizes SIHOT’s technology to provide a continuous and complete data-sharing connection between systems via HTNG/OTA XML messaging. The seamless combination provides accessible pricing and availability data to empower revenue strategies and accurate forecasting.
AVIXA Reveals Winners of the AV Experience Awards
AVIXA, the Audiovisual and Integrated Experience Association, has revealed the winners of the AV Experience Awards. This awards program recognizes the innovative integration of content, space and audiovisual technology to enrich experiences.
“Audiovisual technology can play a big role in enhancing people’s experiences, regardless of setting,” said Dan Goldstein, CMO of AVIXA. “AV can make collaborating more efficient, navigating a building easier, and the act of learning more engaging, among so many other things. As the first awards program in our industry that looks at solutions across vertical markets, the AV Experience Awards celebrate spaces where AV is employed to create that desired user experience.”
The AV Experience Award winners include the following:
- Best Collaborative Experience: Klarman Hall at Harvard Business School/Idibri
- Best Dynamic Art Experience (Tie): Sviatovid/BartKresa studio
- Best Dynamic Art Experience (Tie) and Best In-Person Experience: Datagate: NASA AI Astronomical Sculpture/Ouchhh Studio
- Best Individualized Experience: Yogi Berra Museum/Tritech Communications
- Best Flexible Space Experience: Qatar University’s Sports and Events Complex/Techno Q
- Best Immersive Experience: Alchemist/Audio-Visuelt Centrum A/S
