COMMENT A take on INNOVATION
The traveller will continue to inspire new digital tools in a Web 3.0 world, says Simard chief executive Don Birch
Don’t quote me, but my favourite management book is Diffusion of Innovations by Everett Rogers (gulp!). I am sure you will all be
familiar with the concept of innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority and laggards. The book was written 60 years ago, but the underlying principles have not changed. Foremost among them is that “most people struggle to try new ideas even ŨďĺŭĉďǝŨďóǝæóİóƛŨšǝšóóįǝ obvious”. It seems that as individuals and communities, we are all wired to be predominantly conservative.
DIGITAL CHALLENGES Travel is renowned for being just plain conservative, and for good reason. The travel product is highly perishable: the room night disappears at midnight and the aeroplane seat evaporates when the door is closed. So if you get it wrong, it can be disastrous. ¾óŨǝšĒİçóǝŨďóǝƛśšŨǝóĨóçŨśĺİĒçǝ
ƜĒĉďŨǝŨĒçĥóŨǝƃËšǝĒššŭóíǝĒİǝƣƫƫƫƺǝ we have come a long way. Every day, we happily entrust
ŨďËİǞËİǝËĉóİŨǝĺĈǝŘŭśçďËšóƿǝ The travel wallet, instead of
being a disjointed set of travel segments as we have today, will be a repository of logically integrated elements, not limited ŨĺǝƜĒĉďŨšǝËİíǝďĺŨóĨšƿ Start-ups have
already integrated electric pay-as-you-go scooters into the international business
thousands of dollars of travel spend to websites and expect things to fall into place when we turn up at the airport or hotel. But all is not well. The
innovation of the past 20-plus years has been uneven. It is complex; the system has ËçŚŭĒśóíǝįËĢĺśǝĒİóƗçĒóİçĒóšDŽǝ and there is much too much centralisation of power. Complexity and risk make
change hard, but a decade from now, courtesy of Web 3.0, systems will have substantially changed (that word again) and there will be a new player on the block – the Traveller. Web 3.0 technologies will
have turned the envelop inside out. The traveller will be the owner of the data and, as a
result, will be back in charge. This is already happening. óĈĺśóǝĨĺİĉƺǝƪƢȎǝĺśǞįĺśóǝĺĈǝ
travel will be transacted directly by the traveller using personalised booking tools supported by crypto wallets.
SEAMLESS FUTURE Where specialised knowledge is needed, the travel expert will be invited to participate ĒİǞŨďóǝĢĺŭśİóƉǝæŭŨǝĺİǝŨďóǝ traveller’s terms, and will act more as a service agent
journey and there is no reason why this should not extend to the jump-the-queue museum ticket or dinner reservation. Better still, because all
these elements are related, changes to one can be ËŭŨĺįËŨĒçËĨĨƉǝśóƜóçŨóíǝæƉǝ dependent others. The opportunity to deliver
highly personalised content and value is huge. Like all change, this journey will be a blend of planned activity and happenstance. There will be false starts
and blind alleys. But because the prize is so large – the global travel market is valued ËŨǝǤƫǝŨśĒĨĨĒĺİǝǐǝŨďóǝĒİçóİŨĒƂóǝŨĺǝ get it right is enormous.
8 — OCTOBER 2022 —
TRAVOLUTION.CO.UK
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