In order to be a successful hotel brand, digital has to be an integral part of every company’s business strategy. Highlighting its significance, Laurent A. Voivenel, CEO of HMH – Hospitality Management Holdings, said, “Digital has revolutionized every aspect of the hotel business and more importantly the booking process.
As an industry we are going to continue to see radical advancements in this direction. Not only has digital made our world ‘instant’ and ‘mobile’, but it has been very powerful in terms of our ability to look at our customers holistically – pulling information together to see the unique preferences of our guests. Customer analytics give us a great insight into their likes and dislikes that in turn allows us to service them better and offer products that resonate with them.”
HMH – Hospitality Management Holdings is the Middle East’s first and largest operator in the alcohol-free ‘dry’ segment and has made rapid strides since its formation in 2003. Laurent took over as the company’s CEO in 2013 moving from Starwood Hotels & Resorts. With a masters in business administration, his key priority has been to give the company a distinct competitive edge among regional players equipping it with the best in technology, human resources, and other essential infrastructure integrating core processes, to put it at par with international hotel chains. Continuing its strategy, HMH will be investing more than 50% of its capital expenditure in 2016 on technology upgrades.
Laurent stated, “We must shape our own future in a rapidly evolving digital landscape. These days a hotel’s overall profitability is directly linked to technology and talent that masters that technology. Emerging markets account for about 25% of our business and we project that number to increase substantially over the next five years. What we have to do is to seize those growth opportunities and that is only possible with technology. We have to continue building strong distribution and data-analytics capability”.
