Google I/O kicked off yesterday and among the major announcements revolving around AI, Google also announced Android Go. It is a lightweight version of the upcoming version of Android. As Google crosses the 2 billion marker with Android OS, it is setting focus towards very low end devices to grow further. With this, they will also tailor their own suite of apps and the Play Store to be resource light. By setting focus on devices with low processing capabilities and memory, poor connectivity and most importantly, multilingual capabilities, Google is targeting first time smartphone users seriously.

A lot of software products we see, in travel and otherwise, are often tailored to offer a rich experience to user and in most cases, they require a reasonably powerful hardware. But Android being open source, the devices running it can vary widely including the ones with poor performance and displays and that creates the need to tailor well for the low end devices.

Over 2016, feature phones continued their dominance in Indian market and a large part of the smartphones sales were driven by those replacing their devices according to a JP Morgan report. Delivering quality low cost smartphones to people with feature phones will be a combined effort by software companies, telecom operators and OEMs. India is still the largest market for feature phones globally and the growth in smartphone market (and users for Google services and other software products) will come from converting these users.

In India, Indus OS, a homegrown OS based on Android has been gaining popularity by working with manufacturers who operate in the low cost bracket. While Android is the most popular smartphone operating system in India, Indus had grabbed a 7.6 % market share by May 2016 which was higher than iOS or Windows Phone. The reason behind its success is not only the focus at entry point but also a local language first approach that runs more than skin deep.

As the tech giant Google moves in this direction, it is important for tech startups to not dismiss the development. Some of the leading names in travel have long been building with focus on new internet users as well. MakeMyTrip rolled out its Hindi app back in 2014 and so did Google Maps. Along with this, MakeMyTrip also rolled out Progressive Web App which allowed them to reach customers outside major metro areas and improve conversion on mobile.

Ola cabs is trying to outrun its rival Uber by quickly building presence in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities. To better serve those regions, Ola also launched PWA so that even users with low end devices and 2G internet connectivity can use the service. Metasearch platform ixigo rolled out Hindi variant last year and also tailored its cab booking app to work without data. A recent KPMG report highlights that there is little headroom for growth for English speaking internet users and internet users in regional languages will grow at 18% annually.

It is important to take a hint from the direction the bigger players are taking. Google will be releasing all future Android versions with an Android Go variant which sounds like a really smart move. Getting a user onboard right at the beginning of his/her smartphone journey will also drive stickiness to its suite of services compared to experienced users who are acquainted to a variety of services and products. And if you are still unsure about the impact of language, this might help.

The post Google is aiming low for new users and you should too appeared first on TravHQ.

One of the most anticipated tech event globally, Google I/O, concluded recently with many new interesting announcements for the travel tech ecosystem. On the other side, we are gearing up to host a serious of Startup Knockdown+ events to give more power to travel startups. There was a lot more happening over the month that made for interesting discussions. Just in case you missed them over the month, here are the top stories from May.

1- Facebook brings new ad options for travel brands

A large number of travel brands rely on Facebook for advertising their products and Facebook identifies that. To improve the experience for their audience and give them more control, Facebook recently introduced new Dynamic Ads for Travel to display better tailored ads to people interested in travelling. The social network has also introduced the Dynamic Ad option for Instagram.

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2- Startup Knockdown is coming back with lot more for innovators in travel

We are bringing Travel Startup Knockdown+ in association with TTF to offer the innovators in travel industry a platform to showcase their get in the spotlight. The events will be hosted in four cities with different partners who will be brining lot more opportunities to the table. The registrations for Kolkata event are open with names like Amadeus, NASSCOM, Calcutta Angels Network, Agnitio and many others willing to take the promising ones to next level. You can register at startupknockdown.travhq.com.

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3- Simon Akeroyd shares what Amadeus has learned working with startups in Amadeus Next

Amadeus introduced Amadeus Next last year to nurture a community of travel tech startups in APAC. Amadeus Next has been operating like a startup itself and according to Simon, VP, Corporate Strategy and Business Development, Amadeus Asia Pacific, this has brought in many new learnings for Amadeus. We spoke with him to know more.

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4- Go-Jek associates with Indonesia’s largest local transportation company

Go-Jek, Uber’s local rival in Indonesia, is associating with Blue Bird, country’s largest taxi and transportation company. Go-Jek will allow Blue Bird to move ahead on the technology curve while gaining access to a large fleet of cars to offer through its platform. This announcement came only a few weeks after Blue Bird was in news for strongly opposing the operation of other major cab hailing companies in the market, Uber and Grab.

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5- Hyperloop One successfully conducts first test in Nevada

An idea that was being termed radical not long back saw the light of day in form of this first prototype. Hyperloop One is still far from what it has to be but the recently concluded test shows that ground transportation might indeed become fast, very fast in future. It is being termed as ‘Concorde of ground transportation’ and claims to bring down the cost of a 400 mile journey to USD 20.

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6- Google I/O brings daydreaming and chatty bots

Google I/O 2016 was sure to have a lot for anyone who loves technology. This year, Google announced improved Android Pay, more options in Android Auto along with the ability to use on phone, a new VR ecosystem called Daydream, a new chatting app called Allo along with a smart assistant accessible through it and Instant Apps for Android devices.

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7- Alex Lopoukhine shares how Viator cracked the activity code

Tours and activities aren’t easy to distribute and only few players in the market seem to have cracked the code. Viator is one big name that is strong in the activity space. We had a chat with Alex Lopoukhine, Director, Business Development at Viator to know the key.

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8- Should travel brands start exploring the chat bots immediately?

Chat bots are certainly being seen as the next big thing in travel industry and as AI technologies improve, they will offer more features. However the big question is should travel brands, especially the young ones with limited resources, start exploring the possibilities immediately? The guest story tries to answer that along with some more possibilities that can be explored.

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9- Skyscanner brought in a chat bot and we took it for a spin

While we were weighing down the pros and cons, Skyscanner went ahead and decided to try what they can do with bots, now that Facebook has opened up Messenger to third party developers. We tried out the bot to see what it offers and what it doesn’t.

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10- SITA and ShoCard plan to change authentication process at airports

SITA and ShoCard are working on a prototype based on Blockchain technology to eliminate the need of producing physical identification documents at every security checkpoint. The identity would be stored on a bitcoin blockchain and a token generated by the passenger would allowed for validation of ID against the validation data stored on the database.

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The post May 2016 round-up: Faster transportation and smarter airports appeared first on TravHQ.

TripAdvisor Instant, the feature when it was being rolled out appeared very promising, and it indeed is. The fight is to simplify the customer experience and just like any other travel brand, metasearch players are also trying to make the experience seamless. Sending the customer to another website makes the experience inconsistent and this poses a challenge which is even more prominent on mobile. TripAdvisor, with its booking partners, offered a book button without the customer having to leave TripAdvisor. While this is something the customers would appreciate, some of the biggest players in hotel bookings decided to stay away. The reason? Lack of loyalty and returning customers. The Google assistant showcased recently at I/O 2016 appears to be walking down a similar route.

The Google Assistant looks really powerful and will be able to answer questions and carry out certain tasks. Accessible via text or voice queries, it certainly is easy to access and judging by how good Google Now already is, we have no doubts about its capabilities either.

However, of all these ‘tasks’ it can carry out, jobs like booking events, reserving restaurant tables, ordering food and many other require third party tools. If we are speaking in Indian context, it might use something like BookMyShow for movie tickets or DineOut to book a restaurant table and as a user, I am completely okay with any of these services as long as the job is done. However unlike Telegram or Facebook, you won’t interact with the bot of that particular brand. Instead, you will always be interacting with Google Assistant.

The reason Google says it won’t give other brands direct access is because the experience won’t be as smooth and we agree. However with this, while the brands will get sales, they won’t be highlighted as much as they would want to and this means the bigger brands won’t be interested unless there is a huge volume of transactions coming through this channel which seems unlikely in the early days. Even then, they might prefer other platforms where they can open up a more direct channel of communicating with the customers. Brands want stickiness and might see bots as an addition way of putting their name in the front while having an additional channel for sales or support. The fact that the customer might not even notice who booked that restaurant table for them might be enough to keep them away from the Google assistant.

The opinions that we are drawing at this point are based on what Google has showcased and shared yet and things could be much different by the time the new Google Assistant reaches the masses. Google actively works with developers for its one product or the other so they must have got something in pipeline that we aren’t aware of at this point of time. During the keynote at Google I/O 2016, Sundar Pichai mentioned that they are working on how third party developers can interact with the assistant and more details will follow in the coming months. We are keeping a close watch on what direction this new development takes.

The post Here is why travel brands might not like the new Google Assistant appeared first on TravHQ.

Tech giants like Google, Facebook and Apple push the envelope of innovation and we eagerly look forward to their annual events to see what direction the tech industry will take in future. Google I/O 2016, the 3 day tech event, kicked off yesterday and they had a long list of announcements for the first day itself. Developments with virtual reality and chat bots will certainly find applications in travel industry. We look at all such announcements from the first day of the event:

Improved Payments

It has been a while since Google introduced Android Pay (and even longer since Google Wallet came into existence) and they are now slowly expanding the service to new geographies. Along with that, they have announced an interesting addition. They have associated with Bank of America to enable for users to withdraw cash without the need of a debit card. Another interesting addition is loyalty card payments integration. It would enable users to gain the advantages of loyalty programs without having to carry around those half a dozen loyalty cards.

Better Auto

Android Auto makes very good use of your mobile device in improving your driving experience. Google recently added more geographies to the list of countries where Android Auto works and now they have added new features, the most prominent being the ability to use Android Auto on the device itself. This means that you don’t need to have a car or infotainment system that supports Android Auto. You can simply place your device in a cradle and use Android Auto. The large 5.7 inch device suddenly started to make sense.

Daydream

After scratching the surface with Google Cardboard, Google is diving deeper in VR with Daydream. It is the VR system which will be powered by the upcoming Android N devices and would require the devices to have specific sensors and screens. Clearly it won’t be as accessible as Cardboard but it is expected to offer richer experience. The devices running latest Android will come with Android VR Mode which appears to be along the same lines as Oculus. However it seems that it will be a while before Daydreaming turns into reality as Google was missing an actual hardware to show.

Say Allo

We all know how much affection travel brands have developed for chat apps and they are using these apps in different ways to serve their customers. Now Google has introduced a chat app called Allo which won’t be replacing Hangouts but starting a fresh chapter. Apart from the usual chat features, it comes with a Google AI bot built in. So you can simply tell the Google bot to do things for you. It will enable the users to search or book by simply talking to the bot. At this point they aren’t opening up to other bots but they might have different ideas in future.

Smarter assistant

Google Now is a great assistant for travel and otherwise and it keeps getting better. At this I/O, they announced how one of our favourite assistants is going to be in future. One of the things we didn’t like about Google Now was a very strong focus on search which resulted in it losing the context at times. This time around, they have focused on making it more conversational, somewhat like Siri. At first look it feels like the Google Bot from Allo outside of it. Expect it to better manage your reservations and suggest better restaurants now than just displaying a list of nearby places.

Download without downloading

App retention is a challenge over the entire tech industry. The problem magnifies even further with travel apps as a large number of people don’t travel very often. On top of that there are certain apps which you might need just once. Google showcased Instant Apps which would allow users to download bits of the app instead of the entire app to use it briefly. On the flipside, it also gives developers the opportunity to trigger users into downloading the complete app by offering quality user experience.

Most of the new announcements will see the light of day over the next few months. We look forward to see how the industry will adopt them and make the best of them, especially Instant Apps and Daydreaming.

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