What Lies Ahead for the Future of Hotel Property Management? Two Industry Experts Weigh In

The more things change, the more guests need us to keep things consistent. This is why more hoteliers than ever before are investing in advanced Property Management Systems to improve operational efficiency, manage labor costs, and keep pace with evolving guest expectations. Four experts from across the hospitality industry took the stage at the recent Hospitality Show in San Antonio to discuss the challenges and opportunities associated with adapting to today’s changing world of property management.

Jacob Messina, CEO of Stayntouch, was joined by Adam Harris, CEO and Founder of Cloudbeds; Charles Oswald, CEO of lifestyle and select-service hotel management firm Aperture Hotels; Chris O’Donnell, Chief Operating Officer at hotel and asset management company Atrium Hospitality; and moderated by Michael Frenkel, President of Travel Conversations, in a panel discussion examining the future of property management technology in hotels. Throughout their conversation, these experts touched on the rising costs across hospitality and the rapid rate of change for consumer relations and the guest experience.

While the technologists on the panel were bullish about the potential for PMS technology to continue innovating and iterating on the future of hospitality operations and profitability, hoteliers Oswald and O’Donnell were quick to bring the topic back to the real challenges impacting the hotel industry: labor pressures on both sides of the front desk. It was clear to both hoteliers that today's most valuable technology is designed to be reliable and intuitive. Tech leaders were responsible for delivering this consistent service.

To that end, Messina and Harris were happy to continue the conversation:

Question: How are PMS providers helping hoteliers control costs by improving operational efficiency today?

Adam Harris, CEO and Founder of Cloudbeds:
Hotels are grappling with a critical challenge that's silently eating into their profits: data fragmentation. The average hotel operates across 20 different systems, creating a maze of disconnected data that kills operational efficiency, not to mention lost revenue opportunities. This fragmentation doesn't just complicate staff training and system upgrades but directly impacts their bottom line.

By transitioning to integrated platforms like Cloudbeds, hotels can transform their operations from disjointed to dynamic, using unified data and AI to turn everyday interactions into strategic sales moments. Imagine a front desk employee who, instead of just processing a reservation, becomes a personalized sales representative—identifying upsell opportunities in real-time through intelligent, connected systems.

This isn't about cutting costs, but about creating smarter, more profitable hotel operations that can instantly leverage guest data to enhance both customer experience and revenue. The potential financial impact is significant: hotels can recover substantial margins by eliminating data silos and empowering staff with instant, actionable insights that turn routine interactions into revenue-generating opportunities. 

Jacob Messina, CEO of Stayntouch
With rising operational costs and rapidly changing technology, hotels need solutions that drive efficiency and reduce expenses. Unlike legacy systems that can consume up to 75% of IT budgets on outdated infrastructure, our cloud-based platform eliminates the need for costly hardware and provides automatic system updates at no extra charge. This helps our hotel customers cut costs where it matters most. Our open-API architecture also gives hotels the flexibility to seamlessly integrate with the systems they need to support their growth strategy.

Additionally, with employee turnover in the hospitality industry reaching nearly 75%, hoteliers face high costs in training and retention. Our PMS simplifies training with an intuitive interface that allows staff to become fully trained in just two days as opposed to weeks and months with other systems, enabling hotels to hire from new talent pools and focus on  guest service excellence rather than tech expertise.

Q: What are some of the greatest operations challenges facing hoteliers today, and how are PMS providers addressing their needs?

Messina: We hear a lot from our hotel partners about the challenges of labor shortages and the pressure to deliver a seamless guest experience. That’s why we’re helping them tackle these issues with a modern cloud PMS and automation that cuts down on busywork and enables staff-free guest interactions. For example, automation can save up to 69% of employee time by handling repetitive tasks like data entry, credit card processing, and reporting. Far too often we see and hear that customers are spending time using “swivel chair systems” where team members are responsible for manually moving information and guest data between systems. With an integration library of over 1200 partners we actively reduce and eliminate this busy work and give teams back time in their day to be with their guests.

Plus, our guest-facing kiosks make check-ins super fast—just 30 seconds—with no staff needed. This is especially helpful for extended-stay properties and aparthotels, where guests expect a smooth, apartment-style experience without the need for staff interaction.

Lastly, many hoteliers know they need a new PMS but the thought of replacing a core system is daunting, especially with the amount of time and energy it takes to configure a new PMS. We’ve built our multi-property management functionality with this in mind. Hotels using our multi property template solutions see a 70% reduction in the time it takes to get new hotels live. From there they can save time by managing rates and administration from a single location creating consistency along the way.

Harris: In hospitality technology, we often talk about these disjointed systems creating “data” silos, but the truth is data is fundamentally human. Fragmented data leads to poor guest experience – because every data point represents a guest's journey, a moment of experience, a personal story.

A modern PMS isn't just about connecting technology—it's about connecting human experiences. When guests check-in, their data tells a story: their preferences, their travel purpose, and their expectations. By unifying systems, we transform those data points from cold statistics into meaningful insights that allow hotels to create personalized, empathetic experiences in our living world.

Q: Considering how important integrations are to hotelier success today, what is your approach to integrating new tools and capabilities?

Messina: We believe in giving hoteliers the freedom to choose the solutions that best fit their business, which is why we provide over 1,200 integrations. This enables hotels to customize their tech stack, without the limitations of a walled-garden approach. Our open-API platform delivers the flexibility, customization, and seamless integration necessary to meet the unique needs of every property and group, now and into the future.

Harris: At Cloudbeds, we're not interested in integration for integration's sake. We're building a platform that fundamentally reimagines how hotel technologies communicate. Open APIs aren't a checkbox—they're a commitment to creating intelligent, responsive systems that are easy to use and put the guest experience first.

The future of hospitality technology isn't about how many systems you can connect. It's about how intelligently those systems can work together to create extraordinary, friction-free experiences that save time and increase revenue.

About Cloudbeds

Cloudbeds is the leading platform redefining the concept of PMS for the hospitality industry, serving tens of thousands of properties in more than 150 countries worldwide. Built from the ground up to be masterfully unified and scalable, the award-winning Cloudbeds Platform brings together built-in and integrated solutions that modernize hotel operations, distribution, guest experience, and data & analytics. 

Founded in 2012, Cloudbeds has been named a top PMS, Hotel Management System and Channel Manager (2021-2024) by Hotel Tech Report, World's Best Hotel PMS Solutions Provider (2022) by World Travel Awards, and recognized in Deloitte's Technology Fast 500 in 2024.