This year Travolution is proud to present the brand new Start-up and Innovation Summit. The one-day event is a first of its kind which will see us pair a morning dedicated to start-ups, including a live pitching competition, with an afternoon of content delving into the latest innovation shaping our industry.

Held at The Trampery Old Street, aptly located in the heart of London's technology cluster, on Thursday, October 26 from 8:30am, we will bring together who’s who across the ecosystem, from entrepreneurs and investors, to mentors and organisations that give back and support next-gen companies.

It will also see the launch of the annual Travolution Innovation Report that analyses tech investment in the UK travel sector and showcases the most innovative players in the industry.

Join us for an enriching day that will foster new ideas and technologies, with leading industry experts.

Registrations for the 2023 Start-up and Innovation Summit are now closed. If you would like to register your interest for next year's event, please click here to fill in the form. 

AGENDA

Networking breakfast
Opening statement from Travolution and welcome from Headline Sponsor
Panel Discussion: Travolution Innovation Report 2023 Launch

The 2023 Innovation Report will offer detailed insight of who’s spending how much on what in the UK travel industry. Our excusive analysis of Office for National Statistics data will show how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted what travel agents, tour operators, hotel companies, cruise and ferry operators and aviation firms are spending in five areas of IT. The report will also highlight top travel tech initiatives in Spain as the country continues to set themselves up as an incubator for industry start-ups.

Speakers:

Clare de Bono, country manager, Amadeus UK and associate director strategy & transformation, Amadeus

Lucy England, partner, Fox Williams

Mo Shakarchi, chief product and innovation officer, Collinson

Nick Shay, head of travel & hospitality, Publicis Sapient

Fireside chat: How is Turespaña setting the country up to be an incubator of new players?

In recent years, Spain has carved an identity as a travel technology leader. At policy level, Spain is investing heavily in digital transformation as a central part of its sustainable tourism strategy. Attached to its Ministry is SEGITTUR, a division dedicated entirely to innovation and tourism technology. Likewise, ITH, Spain’s Hotel Institute for Technology, is a non-profit private hospitality and tourism innovation centre whose mission is to improve the sector's competitiveness through innovation and technology with more than 100 pilot projects in place. On the ground, many international travel companies are operating their HQs from Spain. The likes of TUI Musement, Hotelbeds and Travel Compositor, all operate from their headquarters in Palma with Mallorca now coined the Silicon Valley for travel tech”. We hear how Turespaña are setting the country up to be an incubator for new companies in the industry.

Speaker:

Maria Hernandez, head of department, Turespana (UK)

Moderator:

Kate Harden-England, editor, Travolution

First Round of Travel Start-up Pitches

This session will see the founders of five travel start-ups each give short ten-minute elevator pitches about their companies in front of a panel of industry experts who have three minutes to grill them on their plans.

Judges:

Ian Brooks, partner, co-founder and investor in tech-enabled travel start-ups, Gail Kenny Executive Recruitment

Evantia Giumba, business development director, Amadeus Launchpad and commercial director Benelux & France online, travel sellers, Amadeus

Morgann Lesné, partner, Cambon Partners

Mo Shakarchi, chief product and innovation officer, Collinson

Bryan Shaw, partner, Fox Williams

Nick Shay, head of travel & hospitality, Publicis Sapient

Networking coffee break
Second Round of Travel Start-up Pitches

This session will see the founders of five travel start-ups each give short ten-minute elevator pitches about their companies in front of a panel of industry experts who have three minutes to grill them on their plans.

Judges:

Ian Brooks, partner, co-founder and investor in tech-enabled travel start-ups, Gail Kenny Executive Recruitment

Evantia Giumba, business development director, Amadeus Launchpad and commercial director Benelux & France online, travel sellers, Amadeus

Morgann Lesné, partner, Cambon Partners

Mo Shakarchi, chief product and innovation officer, Collinson

Bryan Shaw, partner, Fox Williams

Nick Shay, head of travel & hospitality, Publicis Sapient

Winner Spotlight: My Origin Story and Journey

A new segment for the Start-up and Innovation Summit. Each year, we’ll welcome back a previous winner of the Travolution Start-up of the Year award, to share important learnings from their journey to success and what their origin story looked like.

Speaker:

Alex Gisbert, founder, Fastpayhotels & MD of XEA Consulting

Sponsored lunch break
Panel Discussion: Innovations Moulding Our Industry Outside of the Obvious Ones

As we adjust to life under generative AI’s hold, we bring together top industry thought leaders to evaluate the innovations taking place that aren’t LLMs and ChatGPT specific. We’ll look to explore advancements like personalisation, airport biometrics and security, to management of revenue and property.

Speakers:

Steve Endacott, chairman, Neural River

Adam Gelencser, lead data scientist, easyJet

Tim Waring, head of development, addmustard

Presentation: Building Something That You Can Defend

Startups used to be about building MVPs, testing with consumers and then scaling. But the rules in 2023 are different to what they were 15 years ago, the largest companies in the sector have declared they will clone early AI startups rather than acquire, public MVPs help them as much as they help the startup. In this presentation Alex will outline how defense is the new attack, setting new guidelines for how entrepreneurs should think about their early traction phase.

Speaker:

Alex Bainbridge, CEO, Autoura

Panel Discussion: FinTech - Unlocking New Levels of Growth

Pain points of FinTech in travel still remain, with some viewing interoperability as one of the biggest challenges. So, how can product optimisation and other solutions alike play a part in overcoming this? How do you approach adopting other forces driving evolvement of payments - including real-time payment rails, open banking, embedded finance and digital wallets or super apps - as we look ahead to understand why players that don’t offer “value beyond payments” might not be able to compete.

Speakers:

Angus Hardy, co-founder & CFO, Holibob

Richard Ney, CEO, Lerex

Comfort break
Interview: Spotting the Business Opportunities and Innovation M&As Can Lead To

Now we know not everyone automatically thinks of M&As when they think of innovation but actually mergers and acquisitions should be synonymous with it. Often, they can open opportunities to invigorate new ideas, new approaches and new tech. Join us for a guided session on how to tackle spotting suitable opportunities and what they can mean for business.

Speaker:

Morgann Lesné, partner, Cambon Partners 

Moderator:

Kate Harden-England, editor, Travolution

Destination innovation: How Skyscanner and Estee Lauder helped travellers to find ‘Beauty on the Go’

Everyone thinks of Skyscanner as platform to drive performance to the airline and destination clients, but we are much more than that, we can offer great experience in the upper funnel for the whole range of industries, that are related to travel. We have a really exciting example of our project for luxury beauty brand Estee Lauder promoting their duty free service in the airport Reserve & Collect. As data driven business we used our data to help client to understand the best way to build their campaign as well used some unique targeting options, which overall was very successful experience.

Speaker:

Alina Sutulova, senior commercial manager, Skyscanner

Closing Statement

SPEAKERS

Our speakers are experts drawn from leading travel and disruptive digital brands

Alex Bainbridge
CEO
Autoura
Clare de Bono
country manager and associate director strategy & transformation
Amadeus UK and Amadeus
Steve Endacott
chairman
Neural River
Lucy England
partner
Fox Williams
Adam Gelencser
lead data scientist
easyJet
Alex Gisbert
founder
Fastpayhotels & MD of XEA Consulting
Angus Hardy
co-founder & CFO
Holibob
Maria Hernandez
head of department
Turespana (UK)
Richard Ney
CEO
Lerex
Mo Shakarchi
chief product and innovation officer
Collinson
Nick Shay
head of travel & hospitality
Publicis Sapient
Alina Sutulova
senior commercial manager
Skyscanner
Tim Waring
head of development
addmustard

JUDGES

Ian Brooks
partner, co-founder and investor in tech-enabled travel start-ups
Gail Kenny Executive Recruitment
Gabriel Giscard d'Estaing
vice president
Cambon Partners
Evantia Giumba
business development director and commercial director Benelux & France online, travel sellers
Amadeus Launchpad and Amadeus
Morgann Lesné
partner
Cambon Partners
Mo Shakarchi
chief product and innovation officer
Collinson
Bryan Shaw
partner
Fox Williams
Nick Shay
head of travel & hospitality
Publicis Sapient

SPONSORS

The Start-up and Innovation Summit's commercial partners are at the cutting edge of marketing distribution and innovative thinking