Posts

A follow-up to “Why your AI travel agent can dream up the perfect trip but can’t book it” I published that article on December 29th. Two weeks later, back at my desk with inbox overflowing, I find that Google has launched the Universal Commerce Protocol, co-developed with Shopify, Walmart, Target, Etsy, and Wayfair, and endorsed by twenty-plus others including Visa, Mastercard, and Stripe (apparently I wasn’t the only one busy during the holidays). Their roadmap explicitly mentions “Travel, Services” as upcoming verticals. ...

The travel digital identity gap, and why blockchain bridges it Late September, I’m in Heraklion for our Travel Un’chained conference. Michael Ros from Sleap.io and I are at the resort reception, and they hand us forms (name, ID number, address, all the fields) before taking our ID cards and disappearing to make photocopies. In 2025. Facial recognition at airports, digital wallets on our phones, and a process still requiring a paper scan. I know we both used the anecdote to smile with other attendees, so with this article I officially exhaust its value as storytelling. ...

And how the infrastructure we’ve been building for 2.5 years might finally make it possible It’s December 2025, and AI agents are everywhere. ChatGPT plans your honeymoon to the Maldives. Claude designs a three-week backpacking itinerary through Japan. Perplexity finds you that off-the-beaten-path trattoria in Bologna. Then comes the moment of truth: “Book it.” And the magic collapses. Your agent stutters. It can’t actually check if that boutique ryokan has availability. It hallucinates a confirmation number. It sends you to Booking.com, which means starting the search all over again. Or worse: a Spanish influencer couple recently missed a flight because ChatGPT incorrectly advised them they didn’t need a visa for Puerto Rico, without mentioning the ESTA. The AI was confidently, dangerously wrong. ...

Programme context and Chain4Travel’s participation In late 2024, the European Central Bank (ECB) launched an innovation platform seeking “pioneers” and “visionaries” to collaborate on digital euro development. The programme aimed to demonstrate how conditional payments could be implemented technically, provide opportunities for participants to interact with simulated digital euro interfaces, and explore additional use cases for the digital currency. As part of their preparation phase for a potential digital euro launch, the ECB invited stakeholders including merchants, banks, payment service providers, fintech companies, and technical experts to participate in this groundbreaking initiative. ...