Dive Brief:
- Marriott International is “actively investing” in technology, data and AI with the goal of improving customer and employee experiences, executives said Tuesday during an earnings call for Q4 2025.
- The hotel chain expects to deploy $1.1 billion in investment spending this year. More than one-third of that investment will go toward continued spending on digital tech transformation, executives said.
- “The bulk of the [tech] investment is the replatforming of our three most important technology platforms: central renovations, property management system and the loyalty platform,” CEO Anthony Capuano said during the call. All of the systems have moved from development to deployment, and the company expects they will go live at “a meaningful number” of hotels this year.
Dive Insight:
Marriott International is one of several hospitality stalwarts pursuing AI-driven productivity and experience gains.
Wyndham Hotels & Resorts revealed last year it had more than 200 AI agents handling guest service support at 7% of its hotels globally, an effort that utilized tech partners such as OpenAI, Canary Technologies, Salesforce and Oracle.
Choice Hotels CIO Brian Kirkland credited AI copilots with boosts in software development output and faster employee onboarding.
“Every single week, new technology and capabilities are released by the Microsofts and Googles of the world,” Kirkland told Hotel Dive last year. “Making sure that we’re tapped in, engaged with them and putting our franchisee data and our hotel data in the right place for guests to find it is important to us.”
Enthusiasm in the sector is clashing against customer concerns.
Nearly 2 in 5 consumers surveyed by Reputation are concerned about the loss of the human touch amid the rollout of AI tools. Privacy and data security, mistakes in service and difficulties in resolving issues also top the list of employee concerns.
For Marriott, capitalizing on AI is part of an ongoing, multiyear tech overhaul.
“We see AI as an opportunity to potentially redefine the customer acquisition paradigm that has governed our industry for the past several decades,” Capuano said. “We believe our industry-leading scale, the breadth and depth of our global portfolio, our large and engaged customer base and our strong relationships with partners across the ecosystem position us well to capitalize on the significant opportunities GenAI represents.”
Despite ambitious plans for AI deployment, Marriott executives cautioned the technology is still in its early days.
“Often in our industry, people talk about various facets of the business through the lens of what inning we are in,” Capuano said. “I would suggest to you that we’re pulling into the players’ parking lot. We’re not even in uniform or on the field.”
