Skift Take

IHG Hotels & Resorts sees a future in helping travelers plan their entire trip, not just where to stay.

​​IHG Hotels & Resorts is planning to release a trip planning tool powered by artificial intelligence from Google. 

The hotel giant plans to release the tool in the second half of the year as a feature within its One Rewards mobile app, which the company has been upgrading regularly since relaunching it almost two years ago.

The first version of the AI tool will focus on helping users with the “dreaming phase” of travel, according to Josh Weiss, vice president of guest digital products for IHG. 

“We knew that a significant portion of our mobile app users and our web users have their minds made up about where they want to go … but we also know that a substantial portion of people —  perhaps even a growing segment of our customers — are open to inspiration,” Weiss told Skift.

This is the first announcement that Google is making about a hospitality company integrating its generative AI tech, according to Carrie Tharp, vice pre