Throughout my 30-plus years in corporate travel tech I have experienced a never-ending flow of new solutions developed by local startups as well as global industry leaders – all designed to either improve the initial search and booking process or provide some kind of digital service using the profile and booking data to do so.

The travel tech industry is now entering the 4G phase for travel tech. 1G was client-server based, 2G was browser based, 3G was cloud based. In the 4G phase, solutions become AI based (native or migrated), and once again this evolution will result in stricter rules and requirements from the corporate Information Security (InfoSec) teams, which will slow down the pace of adoption of new AI services even more for travel buyers and tech providers.

But what if we – the travel industry tech providers – could change the narrative and provide the InfoSec and travel buyer community with a new model designed to speed up the process of activating new AI-based services?

Industry support

Recently, I posted on LinkedIn about a growing challenge faced by the travel manager community and the reactions were surprisingly quick and clear. There seemed to be a general agreement among travel buyers that they are unable to keep up with, and take advantage of, all the innovation and new services entering our industry at the moment, due to strict data and security requirements.

This feedback has convinced me of a unique opportunity to use the AI revolution to create a new industry framework designed to get the green light from the InfoSec teams much faster, and help travel buyers launch new services much more quickly, which in turn will provide the travel tech providers with faster growth and improved economics.

Based on conversations with travel buyers in Chicago during this year’s GBTA Convention there seem to be consensus and support around such a concept, and the key takeaway is to figure out how a ‘travel tech certification framework’ could be established.

Obviously, it needs participation from all relevant stakeholders (corporate InfoSec and travel buyers, travel tech providers and industry consultants), but it also needs to establish a strong presence, resulting in an almost mandatory requirement for a travel tech provider to participate.

The programme must run as a non-profit to avoid commercial preference and bias, and a mechanism is required to clearly display a white-list (compliant), a black-list (non-compliant) and a neutral-list (non-participating) of travel tech providers using a structure designed to resonate with travel buyers and their supporting InfoSec teams.

Today, the travel buyers are faced with a major problem. Their access to internal InfoSec resources is limited, and this is preventing rapid testing and usage of new services, regardless of how much value they potentially deliver.

Finer details

Imagine a new model where a travel buyer submits a request to the InfoSec team to start a new service, along with a link to a digital repository where the solution is described in detail, including a tech stack overview and a clear outline of any use of Personally Identifiable Information (PII) and corporate data elements.

The request would also include a summary of AI models used, along with a ‘certification’ stating the latest product review date and, finally, a list of other corporate InfoSec teams who already have approved the solution.

This would most likely reduce the approval cycle to a few days rather than months, and result in much faster adoption of new services for the travel buyer community, and significantly better economics for the travel tech provider community.

In turn, this would motivate more travel technology providers to participate in the programme and strengthen the overall value of the programme as a result.

Would your company support such an initiative, and if you are travel buyer, would you expect this to improve your ability to launch new travel technology services at a faster pace?

I invite you to find me on LinkedIn and share your views.