Arabian Travel Market’s new Future Stage debuted on 14 September with a keynote from Dr Marwan Alzarouni, CEO for AI at Dubai’s Department of Economy & Tourism, arguing that travel brands must make themselves ‘machine-readable’ if they hope to remain discoverable in an AI-first world. Unlike past discussions centred on chatbots, the session focused on foundational issues: data governance, interoperable APIs and cross-sector collaboration. Speakers warned that destinations failing to feed accurate data into large language models risk invisibility as conversational search replaces traditional web queries. The programme aligns with Dubai’s ambition to weave AI into tourism supply chains—from predictive demand modelling for hotels to biometric border control. For global-mobility teams, richer data streams promise earlier visibility of demand spikes that can strain corporate travel budgets and assignment housing. Sustainability also featured, with panellists exploring how AI can optimise flight routings and hotel energy use—topics gaining urgency as investors scrutinise ESG metrics. The Future Stage runs throughout ATM, offering case studies on Chinese outbound recovery, fintech in travel and the ethics of autonomous decision-making in aviation.
Source: WTM/ATM Press Office
