In the travel industry, Artificial Intelligence, or AI for short, and human creativity are inextricably linked. This is one of the conclusions of this years Travel Technology Symposium of the Travel Technology Club with around 120 participants from the digital and travel industries in Kronberg / Taunus at the end of January.
The ,Age’ of Assistants´, has long been there, says Google Manager Julia Leonhard. It describes how KI has long since redefined the connection between man and machine, company and customer. “The interaction with machines has changed completely,” says Leonhard, “today’s machines are adapting to people. Communication is becoming more intuitive. “
Digital language assistants such as Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant can be found in more and more households. “Speech assistants are the next big digital revolution or disruption is Amazon manager Christian Bauer sure of. More than 30,000 so-called AlexaSkills (individual programs for communication between providers and users of Alexa-enabled devices), such as Amazon Echo, are on the market worldwide and are also used by numerous companies in the travel industry. In Germany, these included Deutsche Bahn, BVG, car2go, Fluege.com and FlixBus. According to Bauer, however, not every customer interaction is suitable as an introduction to voice control. For example, on the topic of booking complex travel and services. According to Bauer, however, not every customer interaction is suitable as an introduction to voice control. For example, on the topic of booking complex travel and services.
People remain important even with increasing digitization, but the complete rethinking in the education system is a must
Axel Hellmann, CEO of Eintracht Frankfurt, gave a flaming plea in his speech on “digitalization in professional sports” for the “emotional bond to the people”, which is also essential for future marketing success in sports. He spoke of “emotional reactors”, which should be used even more in the future. Companies worried about being overwhelmed by corporations such as Google or Amazon, and only providers of white label solutions, would have to preserve and expand these emotional reactors.
A totally different view of the relationship between man and machine was cast by Senior Vice President at Dell Doris Albiez. She has been working for years on the effects of digitization on the world of work: “Our complete education system is under scrutiny. Businesses need to stand on their hind legs and demand concrete changes. “Ultimately, the world of work would change massively by 2020. Even highly qualified but highly repetitive professions such as lawyers or tax experts would disappear in large numbers in the future. Albiez: “I wonder why so few people are talking about the dramatic changes ahead of us.” The Dell manager also calls for a complete rethink in today’s education policy. The “bulimia of memorizing” at colleges was abolished. “We need to focus on human creativity,” says Albiez.