Uber is now selling hotel rooms through Expedia's inventory to its 100 million airport riders, with 10% cash back and 20% discounts for subscribers. If you think this is just another OTA with a car service, you're not paying attention to where your next booking is going to originate... and what it's going to cost you.
Wall Street expects $5.52 billion in Q1 revenue from Booking Holdings, up 16% year-over-year, fueled by a merchant model that now controls 61% of total revenue. The question for hotel owners isn't whether the quarter beats estimates... it's how much of your margin moved to their balance sheet.
Booking Holdings gets a bump from OpenTable's "most innovative" recognition, but the award is for AI-powered dining tech that most hotel F&B operations will never touch. The gap between what platforms celebrate and what your restaurant team actually needs at 7 PM on a Saturday keeps getting wider.
