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Smartvel’s Journey from Startup to Industry Leader: Transforming Travel Tech with AI and Strategic Acquisitions

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Thursday, July 31, 2025

Smartvel has gone from a startup in a garage to becoming Europe’s leading travel content and guide business. Overcoming significant challenges along the way, the company has become a key player in the TravelTech sector. With its AI-driven content solutions and strategic acquisitions, Smartvel is reshaping how travelers engage with destinations. In this article, we dive into Smartvel’s journey, from finding the product-market fit to adapting in the wake of COVID-19. We explore the company’s innovative solutions, how it’s adapting to diverse global markets, and its exciting plans for the future.

Finding Product-Market Fit: Smartvel’s Early Struggles

One of Smartvel’s earliest and most significant challenges was finding the right product-market fit (PMF). In the world of TravelTech, where B2B services are highly demanding, launching a minimum viable product (MVP) can be a lengthy and difficult process. For Smartvel, understanding exactly what the market needed and crafting a product that could address these challenges required a lot of trial and error. In the beginning, securing talent and funding were difficult, but overcoming these obstacles helped establish a strong foundation for growth. The company’s dedication to solving travel content needs and improving the travel experience paid off, setting it on the path to success.

The COVID-19 Turning Point: Pivoting to Global Relevance

COVID-19 marked a major turning point for Smartvel. At one point, the company was close to closing its doors due to the global travel downturn. However, Smartvel found an innovative way to pivot by creating a real-time solution that became a global reference for informing travelers about COVID-related requirements. This rapid response not only helped Smartvel survive financially during the pandemic but also opened doors to Tier 1 customers. The solution was integral in restoring traveler confidence and helping businesses adapt to new travel norms. As the pandemic subsided, Smartvel had to pivot once again and adapt to the changing landscape, ensuring its place as a key player in the travel tech market.

Expanding into New Markets: India, Southeast Asia, and the U.S.

Smartvel has expanded its reach into multiple global markets, including India, Southeast Asia, and the United States. Adapting its destination content solutions for diverse cultural and market needs is essential for Smartvel’s growth. While the core content remains largely the same in terms of quality and delivery, Smartvel’s AI-driven platform allows for local customizations based on regional preferences. By listening to local customers and making data-driven adjustments, Smartvel ensures its solutions resonate across different geographical regions. The company’s ability to scale its services and cater to diverse markets is a significant factor in its success as a global provider of travel content solutions.

Strategic Acquisitions: ArrivalGuides and Avuxi

Smartvel’s strategic acquisitions have played a pivotal role in its growth. By acquiring ArrivalGuides and Avuxi, Smartvel has expanded its content offerings and enhanced its capabilities. ArrivalGuides brought a wealth of curated content and a strong presence in the U.S. and APAC regions, while Avuxi introduced a new category of georelevant maps tailored for OTAs (Online Travel Agencies) and hotel chains. These acquisitions allowed Smartvel to broaden its portfolio, providing its clients with a more comprehensive range of solutions. By creating synergies between the acquired companies, Smartvel is enhancing the value it provides to customers, helping them better plan and promote travel experiences.

AI and Machine Learning: Revolutionizing Travel Content

At the heart of Smartvel’s success is its AI and machine learning-driven technology that processes vast amounts of data to ensure real-time accuracy in destination content. By using a complex system of “workers” to analyze unstructured data from the internet, Smartvel can offer precise and high-quality content for travelers. These workers filter out duplicate information, validate content quality, and consolidate it into one simple, reliable dataset. With more than 10 years of development and thousands of lines of code, Smartvel has built a solution that delivers accurate, dynamic, and up-to-date content, even for fast-changing events like festivals, sports, and concerts. This level of automation and quality control ensures that travelers always receive the best possible information for their journeys.

Recognition in the Industry: Deloitte’s Technology Fast 50 Award

Smartvel’s rapid growth and technological advancements have been recognized by the industry. The company was recently honored in Deloitte’s Technology Fast 50, which ranks the fastest-growing tech companies in Europe. This recognition is a testament to Smartvel’s ability to address real pain points in the travel industry while continually innovating and evolving its product offerings. The award reflects the company’s strong sales growth, customer satisfaction, and leadership in AI-powered travel content solutions. For Smartvel, this recognition not only highlights past achievements but also solidifies its future in the competitive travel tech market.

Government Investment: Spain’s Digitalization Push in Tourism

Smartvel’s commitment to innovation has also been acknowledged by the Spanish government, which recently funded the company as part of its push for digitalization in the tourism sector. This funding will help Smartvel improve its Traveler Support products, particularly for people with disabilities, by offering more accessible travel documentation solutions. The project is a significant step for Smartvel, as it will help the company make travel easier for millions of people, ensuring that the experience is inclusive and accommodating for everyone. The investment also reflects Smartvel’s role in driving digital transformation in Spain’s tourism industry.

The Future of Smartvel: Embracing the GEO World

Looking ahead, Smartvel is positioning itself to lead the travel tech market with its focus on the “GEO world,” which is poised to play a major role in the future of travel. Brands are increasingly concerned about losing visibility to agents, and Smartvel is focusing on helping them maintain their presence and relevance in this changing landscape. The company plans to leverage its expertise in georelevant content to help brands stay competitive. Additionally, Smartvel is prioritizing the development of new marketing solutions and expanding its product portfolio to help clients navigate the evolving travel tech ecosystem. The future looks promising, with Smartvel poised to lead innovation in travel content solutions.

Conclusion: Smartvel’s Journey and Industry Impact

Smartvel’s journey from a small startup in 2018 to becoming Europe’s leading travel content provider has been marked by challenges, strategic pivots, and remarkable growth. By embracing AI and machine learning, acquiring key companies like ArrivalGuides and Avuxi, and expanding into new global markets, Smartvel is shaping the future of travel tech. Its focus on solving real traveler pain points, expanding its product offerings, and remaining adaptable in the face of changing travel trends ensures that it will continue to be a dominant force in the industry. As travel becomes increasingly experience-driven, Smartvel’s solutions will help travelers discover, plan, and enjoy their journeys with greater ease and confidence.



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Caribbean Destination Operators Encouraged To Embrace AI Through New CHTA Guide That Prioritizes Sustainable Integration, Cultural Preservation, And People-First Technology Solutions

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Friday, August 1, 2025

The Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association (CHTA) is urging destination operators across the region to adopt artificial intelligence not just as a technological upgrade, but as a strategic tool to enhance guest experiences, protect cultural identity, and ensure long-term sustainability. Its newly released AI Transformation Guide 2.0 offers a comprehensive roadmap for integrating AI in ways that respect the Caribbean’s people-first ethos—helping resorts, hotels, and tourism boards modernize operations while safeguarding local heritage and supporting community-driven hospitality.

The Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association has unveiled the Artificial Intelligence Transformation Guide for Caribbean Tourism: Version 2.0, a fully updated and enriched resource crafted to support the region’s hospitality leaders in integrating AI with care and precision. This new edition offers practical strategies tailored for hotels, resorts, and tourism enterprises to harness the benefits of artificial intelligence, all while maintaining the Caribbean’s signature cultural richness, personalized guest experiences, and commitment to human-centered service.

By expanding on the original edition released in 2024, the latest guide introduces new case studies, real-life applications, and emerging technological trends that reflect the evolving needs of tourism operators. It aims to give industry professionals a clear path to adopting intelligent solutions that elevate service, streamline operations, and build long-term competitiveness.

Building a Future-Ready Hospitality Sector with AI

The new guide encourages hospitality businesses to view artificial intelligence not as a replacement for human roles but as a tool that supports employees, strengthens workflows, and enhances guest experiences. With digital transformation accelerating across global tourism markets, the guide provides timely, region-specific guidance to help Caribbean destinations remain competitive while preserving their cultural authenticity.

Structured into five core sections, the guide offers a detailed roadmap for effective AI integration:

  1. Introduction to AI and Related Technologies:
    This section outlines the basics of artificial intelligence, machine learning, and other emerging technologies that have become increasingly relevant to the tourism sector.
  2. Use Cases in Hospitality Operations:
    The guide explores specific applications tailored to Caribbean hotels and resorts, including guest personalization, chatbots for customer service, predictive maintenance of facilities, and AI-powered energy management systems.
  3. Ethical and Responsible AI Adoption:
    Recognizing the need for transparency and trust, this part addresses issues of data governance, privacy, algorithmic bias, and ethical decision-making in the use of AI systems.
  4. Organizational Readiness and Change Management:
    Businesses receive guidance on how to prepare their teams, manage internal transitions, and upskill staff to work alongside intelligent technologies.
  5. Trends and Future Innovations:
    The guide looks ahead to technologies on the horizon, such as autonomous service agents, robotics, and natural language interfaces, that could transform guest interaction and back-end operations in the coming years.

Encouraging Scalable and Culturally Sensitive Implementation

Rather than advocating a one-size-fits-all approach, the guide urges tourism operators to implement AI gradually and strategically. Each business is encouraged to assess its own technological capacity, workforce readiness, and cultural environment before scaling up AI usage.

The Caribbean’s tourism sector—rooted in community, storytelling, and personal engagement—requires AI integration to happen with sensitivity and purpose. This approach ensures that innovation enhances rather than replaces the core values of the region’s hospitality.

Expanding Tech Resources Through Industry Collaboration

Alongside the release of the guide, the association continues to strengthen its digital support ecosystem for members through partnerships with global organizations in hospitality finance and technology. These partnerships offer:

  • Access to specialized digital tools and platforms
  • Expert-led training and educational content on tech adoption
  • Participation in webinars and workshops focused on operational innovation
  • Discounts on registration for international events, expos, and forums focused on smart tourism

These added resources enable Caribbean tourism stakeholders to remain informed about the latest technological developments while building the skills and strategies needed for long-term success.

AI to Enhance, Not Replace, Human Connection

The guide repeatedly underscores one essential truth: artificial intelligence should assist—not displace—people. In an industry that thrives on human warmth and cultural storytelling, technology should serve as a bridge, not a barrier, to authentic guest experiences.

For instance, artificial intelligence can ease the workload of front desk teams by handling routine questions automatically, freeing up staff to deliver more tailored and attentive guest interactions. In facility operations, predictive technologies can identify potential equipment failures before they occur, minimizing service interruptions and boosting operational reliability. When it comes to energy use, intelligent systems can optimize consumption, cutting expenses while advancing environmental sustainability. These advancements enhance efficiency without undermining the core principles of hospitality or displacing local employees.

Preparing Caribbean Tourism for the Next Digital Wave

With travel expectations evolving and global travelers seeking seamless, tech-enhanced experiences, Caribbean destinations must prepare to compete not just on beauty and charm, but also on digital capability. This guide serves as a timely and strategic resource to position the region for what’s next.

It supports a model of transformation that is inclusive, gradual, and focused on value creation for both guests and local communities. By advocating ethical use, workforce support, and cultural integration, the guide offers a roadmap for tourism businesses to move forward with confidence.

The Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association’s new AI Transformation Guide urges destination operators to adopt artificial intelligence in ways that promote sustainability, preserve cultural identity, and uphold the region’s people-first hospitality values. This ensures that technological progress strengthens—not replaces—the Caribbean’s authentic tourism experience.

The Artificial Intelligence Transformation Guide for Caribbean Tourism: Version 2.0 marks a pivotal moment in the digital evolution of the region’s tourism sector. It empowers hospitality leaders to step boldly into the future while honoring the unique cultural and personal touch that makes the Caribbean an enduring global destination.

Through responsible AI adoption, strategic partnerships, and ongoing education, the Caribbean can harness the power of innovation to not only meet global standards but set new ones—where technology enhances humanity, not erases it.



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Booking Holdings Inc. (BKNG) Bets on AI to Fuel Next Phase of Travel Innovation

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Artificial intelligence is the greatest investment opportunity of our lifetime. The time to invest in groundbreaking AI is now, and this stock is a steal!

AI is eating the world—and the machines behind it are ravenous.

Each ChatGPT query, each model update, each robotic breakthrough consumes massive amounts of energy. In fact, AI is already pushing global power grids to the brink.

Wall Street is pouring hundreds of billions into artificial intelligence—training smarter chatbots, automating industries, and building the digital future. But there’s one urgent question few are asking:

Where will all of that energy come from?

AI is the most electricity-hungry technology ever invented. Each data center powering large language models like ChatGPT consumes as much energy as a small city. And it’s about to get worse.

Even Sam Altman, the founder of OpenAI, issued a stark warning:

“The future of AI depends on an energy breakthrough.”

Elon Musk was even more blunt:

“AI will run out of electricity by next year.”

As the world chases faster, smarter machines, a hidden crisis is emerging behind the scenes. Power grids are strained. Electricity prices are rising. Utilities are scrambling to expand capacity.

And that’s where the real opportunity lies…

One little-known company—almost entirely overlooked by most AI investors—could be the ultimate backdoor play. It’s not a chipmaker. It’s not a cloud platform. But it might be the most important AI stock in the US owns critical energy infrastructure assets positioned to feed the coming AI energy spike.

As demand from AI data centers explodes, this company is gearing up to profit from the most valuable commodity in the digital age: electricity.

The “Toll Booth” Operator of the AI Energy Boom

  • It owns critical nuclear energy infrastructure assets, positioning it at the heart of America’s next-generation power strategy.
  • It’s one of the only global companies capable of executing large-scale, complex EPC (engineering, procurement, and construction) projects across oil, gas, renewable fuels, and industrial infrastructure.
  • It plays a pivotal role in U.S. LNG exportation—a sector about to explode under President Trump’s renewed “America First” energy doctrine.

Trump has made it clear: Europe and U.S. allies must buy American LNG.

And our company sits in the toll booth—collecting fees on every drop exported.

But that’s not all…

As Trump’s proposed tariffs push American manufacturers to bring their operations back home, this company will be first in line to rebuild, retrofit, and reengineer those facilities.

AI. Energy. Tariffs. Onshoring. This One Company Ties It All Together.

While the world is distracted by flashy AI tickers, a few smart investors are quietly scooping up shares of the one company powering it all from behind the scenes.

AI needs energy. Energy needs infrastructure.

And infrastructure needs a builder with experience, scale, and execution.

This company has its finger in every pie—and Wall Street is just starting to notice.

Wall Street is noticing this company also because it is quietly riding all of these tailwinds—without the sky-high valuation.

While most energy and utility firms are buried under mountains of debt and coughing up hefty interest payments just to appease bondholders…

This company is completely debt-free.

In fact, it’s sitting on a war chest of cash—equal to nearly one-third of its entire market cap.

It also owns a huge equity stake in another red-hot AI play, giving investors indirect exposure to multiple AI growth engines without paying a premium.

And here’s what the smart money has started whispering…

The Hedge Fund Secret That’s Starting to Leak Out

This stock is so off-the-radar, so absurdly undervalued, that some of the most secretive hedge fund managers in the world have begun pitching it at closed-door investment summits.

They’re sharing it quietly, away from the cameras, to rooms full of ultra-wealthy clients.

Why? Because excluding cash and investments, this company is trading at less than 7 times earnings.

And that’s for a business tied to:

  • The AI infrastructure supercycle
  • The onshoring boom driven by Trump-era tariffs
  • A surge in U.S. LNG exports
  • And a unique footprint in nuclear energy—the future of clean, reliable power

You simply won’t find another AI and energy stock this cheap… with this much upside.

This isn’t a hype stock. It’s not riding on hope.

It’s delivering real cash flows, owns critical infrastructure, and holds stakes in other major growth stories.

This is your chance to get in before the rockets take off!

Disruption is the New Name of the Game: Let’s face it, complacency breeds stagnation.

AI is the ultimate disruptor, and it’s shaking the foundations of traditional industries.

The companies that embrace AI will thrive, while the dinosaurs clinging to outdated methods will be left in the dust.

As an investor, you want to be on the side of the winners, and AI is the winning ticket.

The Talent Pool is Overflowing: The world’s brightest minds are flocking to AI.

From computer scientists to mathematicians, the next generation of innovators is pouring its energy into this field.

This influx of talent guarantees a constant stream of groundbreaking ideas and rapid advancements.

By investing in AI, you’re essentially backing the future.

The future is powered by artificial intelligence, and the time to invest is NOW.

Don’t be a spectator in this technological revolution.

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Debugging and Tracing LLMs Like a Pro

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Debugging and Tracing LLMs Like a Pro
Image by Author | Canva

 

Introduction

 
Traditional debugging with print() or logging works, but it’s slow and clunky with LLMs. Phoenix provides a timeline view of every step, prompt, and response inspection, error detection with retries, visibility into latency and costs, and a complete visual understanding of your app. Phoenix by Arize AI is a powerful open-source observability and tracing tool specifically designed for LLM applications. It helps you monitor, debug, and trace everything happening in your LLM pipelines visually. In this article, we’ll walk through what Phoenix does and why it matters, how to integrate Phoenix with LangChain step by step, and how to visualize traces in the Phoenix UI.

 

What is Phoenix?

 
Phoenix is an open-source observability and debugging tool made for large language model applications. It captures detailed telemetry data from your LLM workflows, including prompts, responses, latency, errors, and tool usage, and presents this information in an intuitive, interactive dashboard. Phoenix allows developers to deeply understand how their LLM pipelines behave inside the system, identify and debug issues with prompt outputs, analyze performance bottlenecks, monitor using tokens and associated costs, and trace any errors/retry logic during execution phase. It supports consistent integrations with popular frameworks like LangChain and LlamaIndex, and also offers OpenTelemetry support for more customized setups.

 

Step-by-Step Setup

 

// 1. Installing Required Libraries

Make sure you have Python 3.8+ and install the dependencies:

pip install arize-phoenix langchain langchain-together openinference-instrumentation-langchain langchain-community

 

// 2. Launching Phoenix

Add this line to launch the Phoenix dashboard:

import phoenix as px
px.launch_app()

 
This starts a local dashboard at http://localhost:6006.

 

// 3. Building the LangChain Pipeline with Phoenix Callback

Let’s understand Phoenix using a use case. We are building a simple LangChain-powered chatbot. Now, we want to:

  • Debug if the prompt is working
  • Monitor how long the model takes to respond
  • Track prompt structure, model usage, and outputs
  • See all this visually instead of logging everything manually

 

// Step 1: Launch the Phoenix Dashboard in the Background

import threading
import phoenix as px

# Launch Phoenix app locally (access at http://localhost:6006)
def run_phoenix():
    px.launch_app()

threading.Thread(target=run_phoenix, daemon=True).start()

 

// Step 2: Register Phoenix with OpenTelemetry & Instrument LangChain

from phoenix.otel import register
from openinference.instrumentation.langchain import LangChainInstrumentor

# Register OpenTelemetry tracer
tracer_provider = register()

# Instrument LangChain with Phoenix
LangChainInstrumentor().instrument(tracer_provider=tracer_provider)

 

// Step 3: Initialize the LLM (Together API)

from langchain_together import Together

llm = Together(
    model="meta-llama/Llama-3-8b-chat-hf",
    temperature=0.7,
    max_tokens=256,
    together_api_key="your-api-key",  # Replace with your actual API key
)

 
Please don’t forget to replace the “your-api-key” with your actual together.ai API key. You can get it using this link.

 

// Step 4: Define the Prompt Template

from langchain.prompts import ChatPromptTemplate

prompt = ChatPromptTemplate.from_messages([
    ("system", "You are a helpful assistant."),
    ("human", "{question}"),
])

 

// Step 5: Combine Prompt and Model into a Chain

 

// Step 6: Ask Multiple Questions and Print Responses

questions = [
    "What is the capital of France?",
    "Who discovered gravity?",
    "Give me a motivational quote about perseverance.",
    "Explain photosynthesis in one sentence.",
    "What is the speed of light?",
]

print("Phoenix running at http://localhost:6006\n")

for q in questions:
    print(f" Question: {q}")
    response = chain.invoke({"question": q})
    print(" Answer:", response, "\n")

 

// Step 7: Keep the App Alive for Monitoring

try:
    while True:
        pass
except KeyboardInterrupt:
    print(" Exiting.")

 

Understanding Phoenix Traces & Metrics

 
Before seeing the output, we should first understand Phoenix metrics. You will need to first understand what traces and spans are:
Trace: Each trace represents one full run of your LLM pipeline. For example, each question like “What is the capital of France?” generates a new trace.
Spans: Each trace is mixed of multiple spans, each representing a stage in your chain:

  • ChatPromptTemplate.format: Prompt formatting
  • TogetherLLM.invoke: LLM call
  • Any custom components you add

Metrics Shown per Trace
 

Metric Meaning & Importance
Latency (ms) Measures total time for full LLM chain execution, including prompt formatting, LLM response, and post-processing. Helps identify performance bottlenecks and debug slow responses.
Input Tokens Number of tokens sent to the model. Important for monitoring input size and controlling API costs, since most usage is token-based.
Output Tokens Number of tokens generated by the model. Useful for understanding verbosity, response quality, and cost impact.
Prompt Template Displays the full prompt with inserted variables. Helps confirm whether prompts are structured and filled in correctly.
Input / Output Text Shows both user input and the model’s response. Useful for checking interaction quality and spotting hallucinations or incorrect answers.
Span Durations Breaks down the time taken by each step (like prompt creation or model invocation). Helps identify performance bottlenecks within the chain.
Chain Name Specifies which part of the pipeline a span belongs to (e.g., prompt.format, TogetherLLM.invoke). Helps isolate where issues are occurring.
Tags / Metadata Extra information like model name, temperature, etc. Useful for filtering runs, comparing results, and analyzing parameter impact.

 

Now visit http://localhost:6006 to view the Phoenix dashboard. You will see something like:
 
Phoenix dashboardPhoenix dashboard
 
Open the first trace to view its details.
 
Phoenix first tracePhoenix first trace

 

Wrapping Up

 
To wrap it up, Arize Phoenix makes it incredibly easy to debug, trace, and monitor your LLM applications. You don’t have to guess what went wrong or dig through logs. Everything’s right there: prompts, responses, timings, and more. It helps you spot issues, understand performance, and just build better AI experiences with way less stress.
 
 

Kanwal Mehreen is a machine learning engineer and a technical writer with a profound passion for data science and the intersection of AI with medicine. She co-authored the ebook “Maximizing Productivity with ChatGPT”. As a Google Generation Scholar 2022 for APAC, she champions diversity and academic excellence. She’s also recognized as a Teradata Diversity in Tech Scholar, Mitacs Globalink Research Scholar, and Harvard WeCode Scholar. Kanwal is an ardent advocate for change, having founded FEMCodes to empower women in STEM fields.



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