Amazon and Accor Introduce AI-Powered Travel Agent

European hospitality provider Accor is debuting an AI-powered travel assistant through Amazon Web Services (AWS).

Announced Wednesday (Nov. 30), the tool comes at a time when a number of consumers are showing interest in using artificial intelligence (AI) to help plan and book trips.

“Incorporating an intuitive conversational interface, Accor’s new Travel Assistant will empower guests to find the best experiences according to the style of travel they prefer, transforming the entire booking journey from inspiration to after their stay,” AWS said in a press release.

According to the release, the assistant uses AWS’s machine learning and AI capabilities to learn guest preferences, which lets Accor cater to the needs of its “multimodal” travelers, those whose trips are a mix of work and vacation.

The companies say the assistant’s generative AI uses millions of online sources to compile recommendations about hotels as well as local food, shopping and entertainment destinations.

“This enables Accor to offer guidance and inspiration to guests in the early stages of booking and guide them to its direct booking channels,” the release said. “The technology will streamline the booking process down to a matter of minutes, while increasing conversion rate and revenues and reducing call volumes at Accor’s contact center.”

As PYMNTS wrote last month, “consumers show keen interest in AI involvement in their traveling, as evidenced by the increase in digital travel-planning tools helping to craft personalized travel itineraries and generative AI chatbots assisting in flight bookings in several languages, which all create smoother and more personalized experiences for travelers.”

Research by PYMNTS Intelligence found that 63% of consumers said they had at least a slight interest in AI-enabled travel, slightly below the respective 66% and 65% who professed the same level of interest in AI-powered entertainment and communication and shopping.

This interest has led travel-sector companies to increase their investments in AI, such as Airbnb’s recent $200 million purchase of startup GamePlanner.AI.

“Imagine having a personalized travel assistant at your fingertips, capable of understanding your preferences and curating the perfect itinerary — this is the promise of AI as a travel agent, and it is the future that Airbnb, as well as many other businesses, wants to build,” PYMNTS wrote earlier this month.

This week has seen Amazon unveil several AI-related updates, including the addition of four generative AI capabilities to its cloud contact center called Amazon Connect, including Amazon Q, which offers customer service agents real-time responses and recommended action.

AWS has also debuted Amazon Q in AWS Supply Chain, a generative AI assistant that can summarize key risks and envision “what if” scenarios to optimize supply chain decisions.