Redazione RHC : 11 September 2025 13:59

Volkswagen announced on the first day of the IAA Mobility international trade fair in Munich its intention to integrate artificial intelligence into all areas of its business, with the aim of generating significant cost savings. The investment will focus on the development of AI-based vehicles, industrial applications, and the expansion of high-performance IT infrastructure. According to estimates, the large-scale adoption of artificial intelligence could lead to savings of €4 billion by 2035.

The company expects that the use of AI will significantly accelerate the development of new models and bring advanced technologies to market more quickly. “For us, artificial intelligence is the key to greater speed, quality, and competitiveness along the entire value chain, from vehicle development to production,” said CIO Hauke Stars.

The focus on AI comes at a delicate time for Volkswagen, which is undergoing major transformations in two key markets: China and Germany. In Germany, the group is implementing a large-scale cost-cutting program, while in China it is focusing on innovation and the launch of new models to face growing local and international competition.

Confirming its renewal strategy, the automaker announced the launch of a new line of compact electric vehicles scheduled for next year, with the goal of selling several hundred thousand units in this segment in the medium term. Meanwhile, Volkswagen shares rose 1.3% on Tuesday, up 14.3% since the beginning of the year.

One of the reasons driving Volkswagen to invest in AI is the possibility of optimizing complex processes such as supply chain management and large-scale production. With a global network of suppliers and plants, the company could leverage artificial intelligence to predict logistical disruptions, reduce waste, and improve production planning, thus gaining a competitive advantage in an industry where efficiency and speed are crucial.

Furthermore, the integration of AI represents a strategic step to address future mobility challenges.
AI technologies are, in fact, the basis of autonomous driving, the personalization of services, and the onboard and predictive analytics of vehicle data.

By focusing on these innovations, Volkswagen aims not only to contain costs but also to strengthen its position as a leader in the transition to a smarter, safer, and more sustainable mobility ecosystem.

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The rise of artificial intelligence agents will introduce a new layer of complexity in how the hospitality industry navigates customer loyalty, according to a conceptual paper, “Artificial Intelligence (AI) Agents and the Future of Customer Loyalty,” from four researchers at Florida Atlantic University.

The rise of artificial intelligence agents will introduce a new layer of complexity in how the hospitality industry navigates customer loyalty, according to a conceptual paper, “Artificial Intelligence (AI) Agents and the Future of Customer Loyalty,” from four researchers at Florida Atlantic University.

Before consumer reliance on AI, most hotels used brand awareness, search engine optimization, and other tools to cultivate customer loyalty. As AI agents and autonomous systems increasingly make travel decisions and bookings on behalf of consumers, hotels will need to rethink how they pursue and maintain customer loyalty and the guest experience.

“AI agents will be the new gatekeepers of loyalty,” said Anil Bilgihan, Ph.D., professor of hospitality management in FAU’s College of Business. “The question is no longer just ‘How do we win a customer’s heart?’ but ‘How do we win the trust of the algorithms that are advising them?’ Hotels need to prepare for a future where a guest’s preferred brand may be decided before the guest even opens their phone.”  

The paper was published in the International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, with authors Max Ostinelli, Ph.D., assistant professor of marketing; Ye Zhang, Ph.D., associate professor of hospitality and management; Melanie Lorenz, Ph.D., associate professor of marketing; along with Bilgihan.

The shift to AI agents will offload many of the decisions consumers make, instead placing them under the control of autonomous AI agents as they become the primary interface for travel decisions, researchers said. As consumers rely on these agents to search for hotels within their travel preferences, check room availability, pricing trends, review sentiment and make bookings on their behalf, the decision-making process for hotels and travel will come from the algorithm, leading to loyalty to the agent or its ecosystem rather than loyalty to the brand.

“Imagine a traveler asking their AI agent to book a hotel in Miami within a certain budget, with a pool and strong reviews,” Bilgihan said. “The AI is not swayed by traditional advertising; it sorts options based on algorithmic criteria. If your hotel doesn’t surface in that recommendation set, you may never even be considered. This means hotels must design loyalty programs, digital visibility and service experiences that appeal simultaneously to human guests and the AI systems filtering choices on their behalf.”

The paper suggests a framework for hotels and the broader hospitality industry to rethink loyalty strategies as autonomous AI agents become the primary way of engaging and booking travel. While emotional branding still matters for human consumers, marketers must prioritize loyalty programs appealing to both humans and AI systems. Researchers suggest using customer data to tailor experiences while at the hotel, algorithmic visibility, and creating loyalty programs appealing to AI and human users.

“Let’s just take Florida, for example. We welcomed over 34 million visitors this summer alone, and that surge, in combination with technological advances, is rewriting the rules of hospitality,” Lorenz said. “To keep up this trend and stay visible in the future, loyalty must be emotionally resonant, algorithmically relevant, and strategically designed for both human travelers and autonomous agents. AI agents are no longer behind-the-scenes helpers; they’re becoming the architects of guest experience. Hotels that design experiences for both human guests and digital decision-makers will lead the next wave of personalized, predictive hospitality.”

Researchers also warned about potential ethical and privacy concerns in the future, highlighting algorithmic bias as some AI systems may be trained on certain data over others, a lack of understanding on the part of consumers as to how AI agents work and brand visibility challenges.

“At the end of the day, technology doesn’t replace the fundamentals,” Bilgihan said. “No algorithm can cover up for a disappointing stay. AI might shape how guests discover and book, but the foundation of loyalty will always be exceptional customer experience once they arrive. Hotels that combine operational excellence with digital fluency will be best positioned to thrive.”

-FAU-

Oracle is on an all-time roll — and the prophecy written in its stock price is that founder Larry Ellison may become the wealthiest man on the face of the planet.

The company reported its latest earnings results after the bell on Tuesday, including an astounding projection that revenue from its cloud computing will increase 77% to $18 billion this year and could rise as high as $144 billion annually by 2030, thanks in large part to four multibillion-dollar deals with three different customers. By Wednesday afternoon, The Wall Street Journal reported on one of those marquee deals: a five-year, $300 billion agreement to supply cloud computing power to OpenAI.

Picks and Shovels

Oracle said its remaining performance obligations (RPOs), the contracted revenue that has not yet been realized, such as the OpenAI deal that the WSJ reported will begin in 2027, are now sitting at $455 billion. That’s up 359% from just a year ago, inspiring quite literal words of awe from Wall Street analysts during the company’s earnings call: Guggenheim’s John DiFucci said he was “blown away,” while Brad Zelnick of Deutsche Bank said, “We’re all kind of in shock, in a very good way.”

In other words, Oracle has become a favorite supplier of picks and shovels amid the artificial intelligence gold rush. And CEO Safra Catz says that’s because it’s different from cloud computing rivals such as Microsoft, Google and Amazon: “Some of our competitors, they like to own buildings … That’s not really our specialty. Our specialty is the unique technology, the unique networking, the storage — just the whole way we put these systems together.”

More importantly, Oracle’s RPO figure is an indication that the AI industry is preparing to spend big to keep the gold rush from going bust anytime soon:

• In a June filing, OpenAI revealed it was on track to generate just $10 billion in revenue this year, leagues away from the roughly $60 billion it will be paying Oracle under the deal. Meanwhile, sources told the WSJ earlier this year that OpenAI’s Sam Altman recently informed investors the company won’t be profitable until 2029 (and it’s still sorting out its for-profit structure).
• Oracle is similarly putting growth over profit; the company’s debt-to-equity ratio has soared to 427%, with S&P data showing its $21 billion in operating cash flow in the 12 months through August was eclipsed by its $27 billion in capital expenditures. 

Margin Call: The AI moment has not only been very good to picks-and-shovels companies like Oracle but also to financiers on Wall Street funding the massive debt splurge. Not everyone is drooling, though. In a note published Wednesday seen by MarketWatch, D.A. Davidson analyst Gil Luria flagged that “at best,” Oracle is running its AI cloud compute services “at single-digit operating margins, if not serving compute at a loss in some instances,” a far cry from the 50% margins of its legacy business. All the same, Oracle’s share price leaped 36% by the close of trading Wednesday, and was sufficiently high during much of the trading day that Ellison’s fortune briefly eclipsed that of Elon Musk, according to Bloomberg. Oracle’s was the only single-day gain greater than 25% for a company worth at least half a trillion dollars, according to Dow Jones data. ​​It’s also good for the company’s best single-day stock performance since 1999 … or right before a certain early digital age bubble started to burst.