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The article does not mention the potential impact of Roomkey: http://www.roomkey.com/ http://www.roomkey.com/ Based on the articles that the CTO of Roomkey ha

The article does not mention the potential impact of Roomkey: http://www.roomkey.com/ http://www.roomkey.com/ Based on the articles that the CTO of Roomkey has written, I am under the impression that their technology is very cutting edge: http://www.colinsteele.org/post/27929539434/60-000-growth-in-7-months-using-clojure-and-aws http://www.colinsteele.org/post/27929539434/60-000-growth-in... http://www.colinsteele.org/post/23103789647/against-the-grain-aws-clojure-startup http://www.colinsteele.org/post/23103789647/against-the-grai... It is important to note that the big hotel chains had realized that they had fallen behind, in terms of technology, and they needed to catchup. Unable or unwilling to build the technology themselves, they acquired Roomkey (or rather, they acquired Hotelicopter and renamed it Roomkey).

calbear81 14y ago
The biggest downside to a system like RoomKey's is that they only carry rates directly bookable through the hotel. This makes sense from a consumer perspective because you get some benefits from booking directly such as 1) pay at hotel option vs. prepay 2) earn your loyalty points 3) priority when receiving upgrades since the hotel didn't have to pay a commission to an OTA. On the downside, you have to believe in the "best rate guarantee" and at our startup we simply don't see that playing out. When we go out and search rates across all of the OTAs and secondary channels (distributors, wholesalers, etc.), we find a significant amount of price disparity in the market so those who don't shop multiple sources will invariably pay more for their hotel room.