Major trends and IT issues facing the hospitality industry in the new economy: a review of the 5th annual pan-European hospitality technology exhibition and conference (EURHOTEC 2000).

This article discusses the fifth annual pan-European conference on hotel technology of the International Hotel and Restaurant, held in Lausanne, Switzerland from February 16-18, 2000. The conference featured three keynote speakers: (1) Jim Sappington, Assistant Vice President of Information Services at McDonald's Corp., spoke of the challenges of providing global IT solutions and provided some practical considerations and project management guidelines based on his experiences at McDonald's, (2) Arthur Esch, a futurist who studies emerging technologies and their impacts, discussed some leading trends taking place as a result of the digital convergence and the importance of electronic commerce and relationship marketing and (3) Scott Heintzeman, Vice President of Knowledge Technologies for Carlson Hospitality, emphasized the importance of marketing with IT, the need for customer-centric solutions and distribution channel management. The resounding theme throughout the week of workshops and educational sessions was that IT is the single greatest force driving change and complexity in the industry.