The Skift Travel Podcast Glenn Fogel on Booking.com’s AI Strategy, Connected Trip Vision, and the Future of Travel
Oct 23, 2025
Glenn Fogel, the CEO of Booking.com and Booking Holdings, discusses the transformative impact of AI on the travel industry. He shares insights on Booking's evolution and how agentic AI is set to redefine customer experiences. Fogel dives into the company's partnerships with major AI players like ChatGPT, revealing how they aim to enhance the 'connected trip' vision. He also addresses competition with Airbnb, regulatory hurdles in Europe, and the future of pricing transparency, offering a glimpse into the evolving landscape of travel technology.
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Agentic AI Restores Travel-Agent Convenience
- Agentic AI promises to make travel far easier by automating complex coordination tasks like syncing multiple travelers' schedules.
- Glenn Fogel sees AI as restoring the old travel-agent convenience at scale with technology that doesn't forget details.
Priceline Bubble To Long‑Run Value
- Fogel told the Priceline dot-com bubble story: he joined in 1999 and saw stock value plunge then soar over 25 years.
- He used it to illustrate that technology cycles can produce wrong valuations but enduring companies can prevail.
LLMs Layer On Existing ML Work
- Booking has long used various AI and machine learning techniques and now layers large models on top for new capabilities.
- Fogel frames this as an evolution, not a replacement, of decades of ML work at the company.