What we’re nonetheless interested by after ProcureCon Travel 2026

Chad Lemon

Director, Product Marketing, BCD Travel

Conference season is now effectively underway, however one occasion has continued to stay with me. Looking again at ProcureCon Travel 2026, the conversations weren’t simply in regards to the challenges going through managed journey—they pointed to broader shifts we’re now seeing echoed throughout the business. After spending time reflecting on the discussions, one factor is evident: high-performing journey applications aren’t being constructed by way of incremental enhancements. They’re being rethought from the bottom up.

As Chairman for Day 1, I had the chance to reasonable discussions, attend classes, and proceed the dialog within the hallways between them. Across these interactions, one theme emerged time and again: the business’s largest alternatives don’t come from optimizing particular person components of a journey program. They come from rethinking how coverage, know-how, traveler habits, and knowledge work collectively.

Whether the dialogue centered on coverage, AI, distribution, or provider technique, the underlying query was the identical: how can we construct journey applications that ship higher enterprise outcomes as a result of they’re designed round how folks truly journey?

Rethinking the coverage vs. traveler expertise debate

I kicked day 1 off with a daring, deliberately controversial sounding assertion, “Traveler experience shouldn’t sit on the travel manager’s priority list.” Not as a result of it doesn’t matter, however as a result of separating it from price, compliance, danger, and actually something is what creates friction within the first place. That idea confirmed up throughout the occasion. Whether the subject was lowest logical fare, approval constructions, or reserving controls, the underlying problem was the identical: there’s a niche between what applications are designed to do and the way vacationers truly make choices.

One perception was constant: vacationers are likely to make constant decisions, even when these decisions fall exterior of coverage, if this system doesn’t meet their wants. To me, that’s a belief challenge, not a compliance or know-how challenge.

Programs constructed round inflexible enforcement create friction. That friction results in workarounds. Programs constructed round actual habits, with clear guardrails and higher design, are likely to see stronger adoption and extra dependable outcomes. And panelists agreed: When vacationers belief this system, they keep in it. And after they keep in it, the whole lot else—knowledge, visibility, and leverage—follows.

AI is sparking conversations about belief

No shock right here: AI was a serious theme throughout classes. What stood out is how usually the dialogue centered on belief. Travel patrons and suppliers alike are asking a sensible query: What choices are we comfy having AI assist at present, and the place can we nonetheless need human experience concerned?

Attendees noticed near-term worth in AI for streamlining audits and workflows, surfacing insights from giant datasets, and figuring out patterns that inform planning and forecasting.

But conversations grew to become extra cautious when it got here to choices requiring judgment, context, negotiation, relationship administration, or traveler empathy. In these areas, human oversight stays important.

There was additionally broad settlement that AI success is dependent upon sturdy foundations. Clean knowledge, standardized processes, and clear governance are conditions for significant outcomes. As one attendee put it, making use of AI to a damaged course of doesn’t repair it—it merely scales the issue quicker. For many applications, the chance isn’t simply adopting AI. It’s getting the basics proper so AI can ship worth.

Distribution is maturing

It was additionally attention-grabbing to see how the dialog round airline distribution has developed. NDC discussions have shifted from the know-how and providing itself to the truth of managing a multi-source atmosphere. With content material fragmented throughout GDS, NDC, and direct channels, the problem is managing complexity and turning it into one thing usable. That’s why the dialog is shifting towards the decisioning layer—the intelligence that helps applications navigate that complexity and information higher decisions in actual time.

What main applications are doing in another way

Across classes, the simplest methods weren’t about selecting between priorities—they have been about integrating them. A couple of themes got here by way of constantly:

• Connecting knowledge, coverage, and traveler habits right into a single system
• Designing for alternative inside guardrails, somewhat than inflexible enforcement
• Reducing friction and enabling higher choices, as an alternative of controlling each step
• Shifting from lowest logical fare to general worth, incorporating expertise and outcomes

These concepts aren’t fully new—however the urgency round them is growing as applications change into extra advanced and expectations proceed to rise.

The largest alternative nonetheless forward: resort

One space that didn’t come up within the panels I hosted was resort. That’s attention-grabbing, as a result of it’s more and more the place many applications are feeling stress: rising prices, extra dynamic pricing, and better expectations from vacationers.

A couple of conversations touched on how provider fashions are evolving past conventional price negotiations, reflecting a extra real-time, experience-driven strategy. And in coverage discussions, the identical acquainted rigidity confirmed up—price controls that work on paper, however don’t all the time align with what vacationers truly select in observe. Taken collectively, it suggests resort is turning into much less of a set-it-and-forget-it class—and extra of an ongoing alternative for applications to get proper.

Why “open” issues proper now

Those conversations additionally strengthened why we’ve been investing in our open by design strategy. When applications can join content material, coverage, and traveler context extra seamlessly, they’re not forcing compliance. They’re enabling higher choices within the second.

And that’s the place Tripsource comes into play—bridging sourcing technique, traveler habits, and in-the-moment decision-making into one thing extra cohesive and responsive.

Because in the end, the applications that stand out gained’t be those that attempt to management each variable.

They’ll be those that rethink how the whole lot matches collectively—and construct one thing vacationers truly need to use.