What else is going on in the world of travel tech? A round-up of other stories from across the industry.
- Macau.com has partnered with Expedia Affiliate Network to enable the destination marketing portal's visitors to research and book about 149,000 hotels worldwide. The website will also display reviews from TripAdvisor next to properties searched for on the service.
- Kayak CFO Willard "Bill" Smith left the company in March after only 10 months and Kayak last week named Melissa Reiter as its new CFO. A Kayak spokesperson says "after much consideration, Bill decided to move on to new opportunities." The spokesperson adds: "And no, there's been no change in strategic plans" regarding Kayak's proposed IPO. "The company remains in active registration with the SEC." Reiter most previously was Kayak's senior vice president for finance and investor relations.
- NetJets, which enables individuals and corporations to share ownership of private jets, revealed it is launching a joint venture in China with a consortium of Chinese investors, pending regulatory approval. NetJets, a unit of Berkshire Hathaway, says it decided on the joint venture, which will be based in Guangdong province, to meet growing demand for private jet service in China from the US and Europe.
- LiveRez.com introduced a new customer relationship management tool for vacation rental managers to handle email marketing and other customer communications. LiveRez CRM handles features such as emailing confirmations, payment reminders, lock-box codes and asking for post-stay guest reviews.
- Location-awareness is a leading feature of an upgraded mobile app from accommodation metasearch service Hotelscombined. The new version of its iPhone app allows users to search for hotels based on the location of the device, organise results by price, popularity and location, access to product content (maps, ratings, etc) and multiple currencies.