Business Travel Tech Trends presents
10-Minutes Only:
Conversations with Travel Leaders
Today’s Guest: Ken Shanley, Founder of Vindow, Inc.
Business Travel Tech Trends: Frustrations are boiling over as corporate travel buyers conclude one of the most exasperating RFP seasons ever. What’s causing this frustration and what can be done about it?
Ken Shanley, Vindow: Corporate travel buyers are tired of conforming their internal processes to software providers who are unwilling to invest in developing new technologies and they’ve lost patience with empty promises from status quo providers. For example, new AI-enabled sourcing technologies have the potential to revolutionize the hotel procurement process and Vindow is on the cutting edge of that development.
Business Travel Tech Trends: What are some of the key issues for corporate travel managers right now?
Ken Shanley, Vindow: For the last couple of years, hotel companies have been working to recoup lost revenue from the pandemic. Fortunately for them, pent up demand among leisure travelers helped greatly. But business travel is recovering much more slowly, with some predicting that levels will never return to their 2019 peak.
This has created a lot of opposing problems for corporate travel buyers. While overall traveler numbers may be down; hotel rates are way up. Their internal leadership may want to see reductions in business travel spend, but hotels are increasingly inflexible when it comes to negotiating discounted rates and availability terms. Likewise, their travelers care deeply about sustainability and duty of care initiatives, but trying to implement new standards is complicating an already tough situation. This is the environment in which travel managers operate today.
Our mission is to resolve challenges and make hotel sourcing faster and easier for all parties. The Vindow platform was designed to be exceptionally flexible to handle the multiple, sometimes conflicting, priorities of corporate travel buyers. Our RFP sourcing tool can accommodate any kind of negotiated rate business – from annual contracts to groups or meetings & events. And, we make it easy for hotels to quote fixed, dynamic and hybrid rates. Vindow is designed, from the ground up, to provide a level playing field where both buyers and sellers can make smart, informed, data-driven decisions.
Business Travel Tech Trends: What should corporate travel managers know about Vindow?
Ken Shanley, Vindow: There’s so much I could say about our product and technology, but the thing I’m most proud of is our people. Our team has an amazing depth of experience in the hospitality industry. Our CEO, Vic Pynn, is an absolute legend and collectively our team members have decades of experience in hotel sourcing and travel technology, with the most recognizable names in the business. Working collaboratively gives us access to an incredible knowledge base of real-world, practical insights that inspire innovation. In addition, fully two-thirds of our people work in product development and IT, representing our commitment to deliver the most practical, technologically advanced tools in the industry.
TIMES UP!
Our thanks to Ken Shanley, Founder of Vindow, Inc. for your sharing time with us.