This has been a big week for me. After more than a year of working in London, I have finally moved to the big smoke. I appreciate that this may seem like a peculiar topic to raise on the company blog, but if you’ll bear with me, all will become apparent. I found the flat through an app on my iPhone, corresponded with my new landlord via text and email, bought my new furniture online during my lunch break and arranged the moving van from the comfort of my living room on my tablet. What was once a long and arduous process has become relatively smooth and painless; gone are the days of dealing with estate agents and having to conform to the opening hours of department stores. All I can say is thank god for technology!
Working in a tech start-up (where we are entering the final stages of R&D for Stratajet.com: the first online booking platform for those wishing to hire a private jet) I am of course acutely aware of the power that technology has to completely revolutionise an industry, but my experience this week had me thinking about how different so many markets would be if they hadn’t fully embraced what technology had to offer. Whether through the capacity of complex algorithms and intricate databases for storing, processing and manipulating large quantities of data at ever-increasing speeds or the internet providing the public with convenient access to whatever they want, whenever they want it, from wherever they happen to be.
One notable consequence of increasing the degree of technology in an industry is a diminished dependence on traditional intermediaries (such as brokers or agents); not only does this typically reduce costs due to lower commissions, but it also cuts lead-times, increases transparency and reduces communication errors, whilst also giving the control and choice back to the purchaser. Of course removing the middle-man from a supply chain means there needs to be some sort of substitute (in most cases a website) and the success of such disintermediation depends heavily on the quality of its replacement. This development has been seen in numerous markets, but the example of the scheduled airline industry is particularly interesting. I remember when, in order to book a flight, you would either have to go through your high-street travel agent or phone the airline directly, meaning that as a customer you were relying heavily upon the knowledge of an intermediary to sufficiently inform you before making your buying decision. You had a distinct lack of control and choice as the traveller. Given that obtaining a variety of options was complicated and time-consuming, it was simply not feasible to experiment with different dates, times, destinations or airlines in the same way as we take for granted today, unless you were prepared to waste away an entire day while they sifted through the information they had available. Nowadays however, it is a very different story. If you’re looking for a flight, you can head straight to an airline’s website to research a route (whether British Airways, Emirates, or United for example) and book your flight in a matter of minutes. Alternatively online aggregator websites (the new wave of intermediaries) like Expedia, Skyscanner and Kayak provide holiday-hunters with platforms through which to search across a number of airlines simultaneously, to compare prices, routes and times, reducing research time even further. You can filter search results based on countless parameters like travel time, departure/arrival airports, number/length of layovers and price. With all information gathered in one place and presented in a transparent and (relatively) unbiased manner, these sites enable you as the traveller to make informed decisions in accordance with whatever is most important to you, rather than having decisions being made on your behalf by a stranger, who let’s be honest may (often seemed to) have conflicting interests!
Another industry that has seen a complete upheaval is that of retail; shopping has become more convenient for the consumer and the marketplace has become more accessible for the seller/producer. People can now sell and buy items from anywhere around the world, at any time of day, thanks to the introduction of online stores, advances in global logistics and online payment services. Businesses that were once restricted to their local vicinity and regional boundaries are now able to reach out to a global audience. Similarly, it is no longer necessary for business owners to rely on bricks and mortar footfall as they can now operate solely through either their own website or other online platforms like Amazon and eBay. The barriers to entry are dramatically lowered by removing the need for a retailer to build and maintain their own website to sell their products by utilising these international marketplaces for relatively nominal fees.
Similar to the type of development seen in the travel industry, the holiday accommodation sector has transformed thanks to technological advances. Websites like Hotels.com, Booking.com and Trivago not only provide travellers with clear choices when searching, booking and paying for their accommodation, but also provide hotels, from small independent B&Bs to multinational hotel chains, with an international marketing platform. A potential game-changer is the conception of online accommodation and home-share services like Airbnb, where people can offer a spare room or empty property to those looking for somewhere more convenient, affordable or simply a bit more homely than just another hotel suite. They enable property owners to optimise their ‘inventory’ while they are away or in times when they have excess accommodation, and at the same time provide travellers with more of a local take on a destination and greater value for money.
From each of these examples, it becomes clear that there is a great deal for an industry to gain by embracing all that technology has to offer: increased efficiency, wider reach, better communication, etc. From the perspective of the customer, technology provides greater choice, more control, improved access and increased value for money. There remain very few industries that have not fully embraced advanced technologies, but business aviation is one of them. The bizav industry as a whole has yet to take advantage of what technology has to offer, thus making it impossible to hire a private jet online in real-time; you cannot search actual prices for actual available charter aircraft and we are still in a world of quotations, estimates and delayed responsetimes. Private aviation’s reluctance to adopt technology is strange enough given the positive impact that the internet and technology have had on commercial aviation, but seems even more incongruous when you think about the way that technology has transformed aviation from the point of view of avionics and aircraft engineering. It is difficult to say precisely what is to blame for private aviation’s slow progression in this regard: is it the complex pricing structures, the highly fragmented market, the very last-minute ad hoc nature of the business, or is there a lack of incentive for advancement? It is of course the product of a combination of a number of factors, but a lack of investment in new technological tools to bring about some degree of standardisation in an otherwise very fragmented industry seems to me to be at the fore. This is unsurprising because bringing bizav online and introducing elements of automation and transparency is a huge undertaking and much easier said than done. It is however starting to happen; over the past five years, more and more offerings are entering the market, and the industry is taking small steps towards harnessing the power of technology. Fortunately technology has a habit of breeding more technology and, by nature, as we have seen, technology streamlines processes and makes work systems more efficient. As each element of the bizav value chain becomes better connected and integrated, communication improves, the consequential increased transparency, flexibility and efficiency will make the market a better place for both customers and suppliers.
It is strange to think how different the last week could have been for me; in fact, it’s safe to assume that if it wasn’t for technology, my search would have taken considerably longer and been considerably more painful. Being part of Generation Y, I will openly (though ashamedly) admit that I struggle to fathom what the world was like before the advent of technology. Don’t get me wrong, there is a certain romance to doing things in the traditional way – such as reading a dog-eared book rather than an E-reader – but when it comes to efficiency, transparency and accessibility, technology is the only way to go. Not even 10 years ago, people were hugely sceptical about trusting the internet with their credit card details, or relying upon a website for something as complex as searching for real-estate, always preferring the reassurance of interaction with an experienced broker, but now it has become second nature and technology in general has become an integral part of our daily lives. I believe that bizav is starting to progress past the phase of resistance, even if there still remains some hesitation and scepticism amongst many in the industry. People have said that it would be impossible to build the technology required to automatically, instantly and accurately calculate the cost of a private flight, given the inherently ad hoc nature of the industry – Stratajet has already built this technology. They also said private jet users would never feel comfortable booking a private jet online or through a mobile app and many recent examples have proven those naysayers wrong too. If other industries are anything to go by, I am extremely excited to see how tech will shape the private aviation industry over the next five years. The key will be the marriage of certain human aspects with advanced technology doing what it does best, making everyone’s lives easier. Just as my move was made simpler, faster and more effective thanks to technology, I look forward to the day when the process of chartering a flight is possible in just a few easy clicks.
Christina Hayes
Marketing Assistant