Wifi in the air - early reports on the experience on GoGo on Virgin America

I am not looking forward to the roll out of Wifi on aeroplanes. There is something safe and calming about getting on a plane and knowing that I am out of contact and can either focus on clearing old emails and work projects or simply taking a bit of time off before a busy week (or after a busy week). But the push to Wifi on planes is now inevitable.

Virgin America has just rolled out GoGo Inflight on its flights. If you are interested in hearing about the experience and feed back (which has all been positive). Check out the top ten things you need to know on Gizmodo or listen to the first 12 minutes of epsiode 170 of Twit where Ryan Block of gdgt talks about his experience.

thanks to blinder.donedat for the photo from flickr

Yahoo sells Kelkoo for Euro 100mm to Jamplant (UK investment firm)

Yahoo! bought Kelkoo back in 2004 for Euro 475. News out late yesterday that they have sold it for Euro 100 million to Jamplant - a UK investment firm I have not heard of. This a significant loss for Yahoo! both in terms of capital losses but also in functionality. On the positive side for Yahoo because after three good years in 2007 the business lost Euro12 million. I can see the short term benefit but in the long term I think Yahoo will regret exiting meta-search. French language news story here including a table showing the turnover and losses. TechCrunch story here including English language version of the internal email.

Back at Gate 64 in Hong Kong Airport

My flight from the US to Sydney is going through Hong Kong (don't asked). The LAX to HKG leg landed at Gate 64. Brings back some very disturbing memories.

Kayak CEO Steve Hafner on PhoCusWright Center Stage

Here is a quick list of quotes from Kayak CEO Steve Hafner that I Twittered during his PhoCusWright Center Stage Interview with Philip Wolf.

"Kayak's traffic was three times Sidestep when they bought them"

"The jury is out for the media model on retail sites"

"Bartels at Travelzoo has $80mm of revenue in their P&L. I want it. Of course they are a competitor"

"brought out a great mobile product a few years ago. Was used by 1000 people"

"next year will be talking about consolidation in OTAs (online travel agents), new faces at the top of some, cost cutting and site improvements. Can't believe how cluttered OTA home pages are"

Priceline CEO Jeffery Boyd on PhoCusWright Center Stage

Philip Wolf has just finished interviewing Priceline CEO Jeffery Boyd at PhoCusWright 2008.

Here is my summary.

On US v International

• Already have more than 50% of business outside of US (see Expedia CEO's comments from yesterday). The international hotel business overtook US in terms of size at the end of 2006; and
  
• International split is reflected in staff numbers with 1,600 total staff but only 340 in the US (but note another 6-700 more in outsourced US customer service).
  

On moving away from the opaque model and doing acquisitions in Europe

• Was an easy decision to move away from the opaque model and air reliance as the business was shrinking. Now down to less than a third of the business being the merchant model and the largest part of that merchant model is hotel;
  
• (not surprisingly) very happy with 2004 acquisition of Activehotels and 2005 acquistion of Bookings.com. There was some unhappiness at Active when the brand was dropped in favour of Booking.com but believes it was the right business decision. Boyd did not provide a direct answer to questions on whether he would expand the Booking brand to the US but did say "with a product in English and the strength of Google we can sell to anyone";

On Asia and Australia

• (again) very happy with Agoda acquisition. It generated $30mm in gross bookings in Q3
• Boyd was asked about the strength of Wotif in Australia. He reiterated that there is a lot of opportunity for more competition in Australia. Booking.com are opening an office in Australia with through "a person based in New Zealand" (I assume he means Agoda Chairman Adrian Currie Update - received a message from inside Priceline that Boyd was referring to someone else. Adrian Currie is based in NZ but is the Chairman of Agoda and head of Asia for Booking.com) .
  

On Mobile

• In the US - about service and support, not transactions for now;
  
• In the rest of the world - likely to be much faster to transactions on mobile; and
• Generally -"have a mobile site that is caveman in its advancement but are focused on it".
  

On the Year ahead

Paraphrasing Boyd he said the following: There will be a shake out in the coming year. Companies that are well capitalised and watch expenses will do a little better. The industry survived and grew post 9/11 so we will get through this.

The Renaissance Hollywood Hotel wants more money

I have been at the Renaissance Hollywood Hotel this week as part 1,000 people attending the PhoCusWright 2008 Conference at this hotel. I have tried to be a good guest - no unnecessary demands of staff, tipping everyone that looks my way. I asked very nicely to be able to check out at 3pm rather than the 1pm they offered. "I am sorry sir but that will be an extra $25 per hour" was the reply. "But, I have been staying here for six days as part of a very large conference, surely you can be nice to me and extend my check out for no charge" was my polite reply. "Can't help you sir, we have to charge $25 per hour" was the response.

Clearly they do not have to charge me anything. But it is equally clear that they want to charge me more and have no need to reward me for a long stay. I see this an being greedy. The Renaissance Hollywood should give me two hours for nothing after six days of paying. What do you think I am being too demanding?

PhoCusWright Travel Innovation Summit - Video of all of the presentations

Here is the video list where you can watch 13 minute presentations from the 32 companies from the PhoCusWright Travel Innovation Summit. You can select which one you wish to listen to. My pick of the top six are here. The six finalists here. You should also listen to YourTour, ekit, nileguide, planeteye, tripchill and travelbeen.