The FINANCIAL — IHG, one of the world’s leading hotel companies, announced that InterContinental Hotels & Resorts has collaborated with Baidu to introduce the next generation of intelligent hospitality.
Smart Rooms, which are powered by artificial intelligence, are expected to improve and redefine customer hotel experience in China’s hospitality industry. From now on, guests staying at InterContinental Beijing Sanlitun and InterContinental Guangzhou Exhibition Centre will be amongst the first to enjoy the AI Smart Rooms. A total of 100 AI powered Club InterContinental suites will be available at InterContinental hotels in gateway cities and key destinations across China within the year, according to IHG.
Customised for InterContinental Hotels & Resorts, the AI solution is developed by Baidu’s DuerOS Platform. It integrates AI technology with hotel operations, and this is supported by hardware upgrade and cloud service. Unlike traditional guest rooms, the newly launched AI Smart Room will fully embrace voice control technology to deliver a more natural human-computer interactive experience. For instance, guests will be able to freely switch settings between work and leisure modes, and enjoy a more convenient and seamless room service experience. This solution will also further fine-tune the current backstage management system, including customising information and resetting devices, making hotel management a simpler task.
IHG and Baidu inked a strategic partnership on AI development last November. Since then, the hospitality industry has witnessed a new wave of exploration in this field. The application of AI has gone beyond smart homes and automatic driving, and now marks a new milestone in the hospitality industry. In the future, IHG and Baidu will continue the exploration and innovation in intelligent hospitality solutions, creating more smart options and experiences for guests.
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