New Episode Drops 12/2: Adam Harris, CEO of Cloudbeds:
This week’s episode is with Adam Harris, the co-founder and CEO of Cloudbeds — one of the most influential hotel-tech companies on earth, powering 1.2M+ rooms across 157 countries.
How “Bark for Beer” (yes, really) helped start Cloudbeds
Why Cloudbeds acquired a tiny channel manager that ended up eliminating their competition
How “systems of action” will replace legacy PMS thinking
Travel & AI News:
1) Marriott & MGM Launch Joint Booking Platform — Finally Live
Source: Marriott - MGM
Sloan’s Take:
This is a power move. Marriott is quietly building an entertainment- experience-plus-hospitality empire.
2) Airbnb Announces “Group Trip Planning” Powered by Generative AI
Source: Airbnb Article
Sloan’s Take:
Airbnb is recreating the future of trip planning while hotels still brag about kiosks and mobile keys. Hotels are competing on amenity upgrades while Airbnb is competing on workflow ownership.
3) Booking.com Expands “AI Trip Planner” Globally After Huge EU Pilot
Source: Booking.com AI Trip Planner
Sloan’s Take:
OTAs are now the discovery layer AND the experience engine. If brands don’t build their own AI-driven inspiration funnels, they become pure commodity inventory.
4)“J.P. Morgan Launches ‘Liquid AI’
Source: JP Morgan Chase
Sloan’s Take:
Hotels are still arguing about AI chatbots while Wall Street is deploying sector-trained models to reprice the world in real time. AI isn’t a toy or just for research... It’s becoming an underwriting partner.
5)“Taiwan Introduces World’s First AI-Powered Smart Passport” - I just spent the last 10 days here in Taipei & will be sharing more from my trip & experience…
Taiwan is testing AI-secured passports that embed biometric-matching, fraud detection, travel history validation, and smart-lane border automation — built so travelers can process immigration in under 10 seconds.
Sloan’s Take:
Travel infrastructure is modernizing faster than hotels themselves.
When governments and airports adopt AI to eliminate friction, every remaining inefficiency in the hotel arrival experience becomes intolerable.
If your check-in process still requires waiting, tapping, typing, or scanning… you're already behind. The AI-accelerated traveler is going to demand AI-accelerated hotels.
The future just pulled ahead. Time to catch up.
Stay Not Done.
Cheers, Sloan