INTELITY®, a guest experience and staff management platform, announced The Little Nell in Aspen, Colorado, has implemented the INTELITY platform, via smart-room tablets, which provide the property’s guests with a more digital, upscale experience, as well as GEMS®, INTELITY’s collection of staff-facing tools.

Located at the base of Aspen Mountain, The Little Nell is Aspen's only five-star, five-diamond, ski-in/ski-out hotel. The property boasts luxurious amenities, personalized service, beautiful mountain views, renowned restaurants, and spacious accommodations, including 92 guest rooms and suites. 

Each of the rooms and suites now features INTELITY’s robust guest experience platform delivered on a Bluetooth-enabled smart-room tablet that acts as a digital compendium to provide guests with detailed information regarding all aspects of the property, including, services, amenities, menus for on-site restaurants, a list of events, and more. With a tap of a finger, guests can request services and amenities, while staff can easily track and manage these requests via the INTELITY back-end platform and its integration with the property’s internal communications system, ALICE. The Little Nell's team can manage all content of the smart-room tablets from the INTELITY platform’s backend, including real-time updates to their digital compendiums, food and beverage menus, and digital storefront items. Additionally, the INTELITY-powered smart-room tablets provide guests with access to news and media sites, as well as allow them to check their flight status. 

“The INTELITY platform provides us with endless application options to best inform our guests and offer conveniences for them, and the digital aspect of delivery over tablets supports our environmental and sustainability efforts by reducing the amount of paper collateral needed in a guest room, which has long been one of our objectives,” said Henning Rahm, The Little Nell’s General Manager. “We are excited to have partnered with INTELITY on this initiative.”

Additional benefits for The Little Nell are the advertising capabilities that INTELITY’s platform provides by allowing the property to promote its activities, adventures, and on-site events directly to guests. From the menu item tabs to the ad banner, guests can easily navigate through the list of free and for-purchase events and activities to enhance their stay in Aspen. The home screen configuration acts as a smart display with features, such as reservation details, date, time, and weather, plus the ability to set up alarm clocks. Guests can also check on and keep track of their requests and any accrued charges to their room during their stay.

Thanks to the INTELITY platform’s integration capabilities, the smart-room tablets are also integrated with The Little Nell’s internal service request system, which allows guests the convenience of submitting a variety of requests — from fresh towels to ice buckets to dog bowls. 

“We are delighted to have added The Little Nell to the INTELITY family of properties,” said Robert Stevenson, INTELITY’s CEO. “INTELITY’s platform will create a more seamless and memorable journey for guests at one of the best ski destinations on the planet while easing the back-of-house operations for The Little Nell's staff."

ShiftPixy, Inc., a Miami-based national staffing enterprise which designs, manages, and sells access to a disruptive, revolutionary platform that facilitates employment in the rapidly growing Gig Economy, announced the successful beta implementation of its AI-powered recruitment system, leveraging ChatGPT’s open API, designed to address the growing gap in opportunity matching and recruitment efficiency.

For an overview of ShiftPixy’s AI recruiting engagement, please view this video.

Current statistics reveal a significant gap in the recruitment industry, with recruiters receiving an average of 250 resumes for each open position, but only 12% of applicants meeting job requirements. With more than 27 million workers seeking opportunities in the US alone according to Harvard Business School, the need for a more efficient recruitment process is paramount.

ShiftPixy's AI recruiting system tackles this challenge head-on by meeting workers where they are, capturing and aligning the best candidates for each opportunity, and actively guiding workers through the hiring process to start their gig. The platform's sophisticated automation effectively streamlines capturing, qualifying, screening, and deployment in the recruitment process. By continuously tracking and analyzing activity and data, ShiftPixy's AI-driven recruiting platform is constantly learning and adapting to improve its effectiveness, leading to a more dynamic and efficient recruitment process for both job seekers and employers.

“There’s plenty of talk about how AI might do for business. We are focused on what we can do today with a high value application for AI in our business flow and it is only getting better” said Scott Absher, Co-Founder and CEO of ShiftPixy. “Our R&D has been to apply AI to human friction points in our human capital workflows. Where people lack speed or attention to the detail, our machine process is highly personal, results focused and always reliable.”

Watch Scott Absher’s recent interview with Market Scale about how AI technology can boost efficiency in recruitment here.

Uniguest, a provider of digital engagement technology to multiple end markets, announced enhancements to its Hotel TV guest room entertainment offering with the launch of a new SaaS cloud solution. 

The release leverages cutting-edge guest room entertainment technology from Otrum, a hospitality platform acquired by Uniguest in 2022 with a proven track record in providing engagement technology having deployed to over two hundred thousand rooms. 

The integration of Otrum technology into the Uniguest Hotel TV offering means that all aspects of creating and managing in-room entertainment is cloud-based. The solution is accessed via an intuitive browser-based portal enabling hotels and brands to access, manage and monitor guest room entertainment services from anywhere.  

Enhancing the Uniguest Digital Engagement Platform with fully-cloud Hotel TV, backed up by the solution’s proven track record, ensure that best in class uptime and redundancy can be offered, with the additional scalability and benefits that a SaaS deployment brings.   

Uniguest’s new Hotel TV platform also provides hotels and brands with: 

• Intuitive drag and drop content editor 

• Flexible customization tools 

• Casting support for guest devices using apps such as Netflix or Hulu 

• System on chip support removing the requirement for additional set top box hardware.  

• Integrations with other platforms, including leading property management systems.  

Price Barnes, Uniguest VP of Product Management, said, "We are pleased to bring Otrum's powerful cloud-based guest room entertainment solution to the US market as part of the Uniguest platform. This solution solidifies our company's aim to deliver cutting-edge, flexible, and easy to use technology. We see these enhancements as the first step in revolutionising our Digital Engagement Platform, which is already well established within many hotels and hospitality brands.  

“As we drive towards our goal of connected content, deployed everywhere, creating engaged audiences this is a huge next step.” 

The World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) and the Saudi-based Sustainable Tourism Global Center have unveiled groundbreaking new data detailing the total water usage of the global Travel & Tourism sector.

In one of the largest research projects of its kind, WTTC can for the first time ever, accurately report and track the impact the sector has on the environment. 

The findings were launched today at the United Nations in New York at the UN 2023 Water Conference. 

Direct Water Use 

Speaking at the UN Headquarters, Chris Imbsen, Director of Sustainability at WTTC, revealed that Travel & Tourism’s entire water footprint is just 0.6% of the global water use according to the latest figures (2021). 

In 2019, when the sector was at its peak, the sector’s total water footprint was only 50% higher, but still less than 1% of the global total at 0.9%. 

Travel & Tourism’s direct water use is significantly lower – in 2019 it was 0.2% of the global total and has fallen by half to just 0.1% of the global total. 

Much of the sector’s water use is indirect, through its supply chain, with agriculture and food production accounting for two-thirds of Travel & Tourism’s entire water footprint. 

Between 2010 and 2019, the Travel & Tourism sector in Europe and Africa reduced direct water use. In Europe, direct water use fell by 8% and in Africa direct water use by the sector fell by 6%. 

Julia Simpson, WTTC President & CEO, said: “This ground-breaking new data reveals our sector’s water consumption for the first time ever, revealing that Travel & Tourism uses less than 1% of the water used around the world, with the overwhelming majority of that usage coming from the sector’s supply chain.

“The data also shows that whilst the sector has grown economically around the world, its direct-use water intensity has decreased. 

“The data is the most in depth study of the sector’s water use, and like the world-first cli-mate footprint data we released at our Global Summit in Riyadh last year, we can also re-veal individual countries Travel & Tourism sector’s water footprints. This will enable gov-ernments to work with the sector to further reduce water usage.” 
 

Water Intensity 
 

The water intensity of Travel & Tourism per unit of GDP has also fallen since 2010, across both direct and indirect use.  

In 2010, the sector used 0.57m³ of water for every $1 USD contributed to the global economy. 

In 2019 this fell by 19% to reach 0.46m³ of water for every $1 USD contributed to the global economy. 

In a world-first, this comprehensive research covers 185 countries across all regions and will be updated each year with revised figures. 

This research was made possible thanks to the partnership between WTTC and the Saudi-based Sustainable Tourism Global Center. Under the Saudi green Initiative, more than 60 initiatives have been launched in the past year, representing more than $186BN USD of in-vestment in the green economy. 

Yum! Brands, Inc. today announced the promotion of Shannon Hennessy to The Habit Burger Grill Division Chief Executive Officer, reporting to Yum! Chief Executive Officer David Gibbs, effective June 6.

Hennessy, who currently serves as President of The Habit Burger Grill Division, will succeed Russ Bendel, who is retiring in June. As CEO, Hennessy will continue to build on the brand’s unique strengths and assume responsibility for driving its overall growth strategies and performance.

“Shannon is an exceptional, heart-led leader who was named President of The Habit Burger Grill Division in July 2022 and has since driven meaningful advances for the brand in development, top line initiatives and digital sales growth,” said Gibbs. “With Shannon’s background as KFC Global Division CFO and her nearly 20 years with McKinsey & Company, she has a unique skillset that will be vital as we continue to scale The Habit, offering our franchisees an investment opportunity in an award-winning, fast-casual concept in the better-burger category with a long runway for growth. I’m thrilled Shannon and Russ have worked so closely together to ensure a seamless transition and am confident in the long-term growth of The Habit.”

As President of The Habit Burger Grill, Hennessy has overseen development, franchising, marketing and international expansion. In this role, she has also been responsible for contributing to the brand’s strategy to accelerate growth, nurturing cross-brand collaboration and driving company culture. Hennessy joined Yum! in 2020 as the Chief Financial Officer of KFC Global Division, where she was responsible for leading the global finance function and ensuring continued growth and profitability of the KFC business. She also oversaw the brand’s global financial planning, supply chain management and strategy functions.

Yum! Brands acquired The Habit Burger Grill in March 2020. In 2022, The Habit grew the franchise base of its approximately 350 restaurants to 18%, up five percentage points from the previous year. In addition, The Habit ended 2022 with a digital mix of 35% and delivered $2 million in average unit volumes.

Incode Technologies, an ID proofing company, announced a strategic partnership with guest technology services companies, Advanced Living Technologies (ALTec) and its sister company, at-visions. ALTec will leverage Incode's innovative biometric, omnichannel identity verification and authentication platform for a variety of services including Know Your Date (KYD)/Age Verification, Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance and reusable identity. The agreement, powered by Incode's AI/ML and biometric solutions, will enable ALTec and at-visions to transition gaming and hospitality away from decades-old technology and redefine the guest experience status quo, respectively.

The combination of increasing data breaches and fraud as well as the frequency hoteliers and gaming establishments repeatedly ask their customers to verify their identities have expedited the need for robust, next-generation identity proofing. By choosing to rely on traditional, centralized methods that store user data and are frequently targeted by hackers, security and privacy are compromised, leading to harm for individuals, businesses, and society at large. With over $8.8 billion reported losses reported by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in 2022, the importance of secure authentication and seamless customer experience is critical to organizations' success.

ALTec, with its identity product, SONIO, says Incode's modular and fully automated ID, Liveness POA, and Watchlists features stood out from other providers in the gaming industry. While many vendors remain concentrated in a single region or country, and have weaknesses in other locales, Incode offers multiregional and global product offerings, training their AI/ML models to each of a client's target markets. As identification draws more attention from legislators around the world, Incode's comprehensive identity verification (IDV) validates over 4,600 distinct documents against governments and central databases, confirming a person is the genuine owner of the real-word identity they are claiming.

At-visions specializes in IP streaming solutions for mobile applications, networks, and digital signage in the hospitality industry. With their technology, customers can offer state-of-the-art entertainment to match the demands of guests for content such as streaming, as well as providing a communication platform to promote services. At-visions is capitalizing on ALTec's existing verifications customer base to resell SONIO, embedded with Incode's identity verification solutions, into the hospitality sector.

"While we're continuously reminded of both the risks associated with human-in-the-loop verification and how AI/ML helps reduce bias, inaccuracies, and inefficiencies, legacy providers are also challenged to move away from slow, physical commerce and shift to seamless, touchless transactions," said Ricardo Amper, CEO and Founder of Incode. "ALTec and at-visions share Incode's commitment to One Identity Everywhere and this partnership of guest-facing technologies and unrivaled track record in identity systems with ongoing and rigorous certifications completely transforms the customer journey. The ability to offer our identity solutions to at-visions' robust customer base will enable innovation in time-tested industries and, ultimately, a reimagining of the trust between hotel guests, gamers, and the organizations that serve them."

ALTec's Chief Business Officer Dieter Kindl said: "We see that all around the globe, identification in every industry is gaining importance  and it's why we're thrilled to partner with Incode—a pioneering leader in the identity proofing sector. Our vision of combining several fraud prevention and compliance services and ID verification in one platform is possible only with biometrics, a reliable and efficient means of enhancing data security and user authentication."

This agreement comes on the heels of Incode's product showcase at ICE London, and ALTec's vision ushering the next generation of customer experiences at a global scale for gaming and hospitality and shaping the future of trust in verification and authentication.

To learn more, please visit: www.incode.com