Travel Through the Lens of AI with with Booking.com CEO Glenn Fogel
Travel Through the Lens of AI with with Booking.com CEO Glenn Fogel
Travel Through the Lens of AI with with Booking.com CEO Glenn Fogel
Shownote
Shownote
When Glenn Fogel joined Priceline in 2000, the business was worth a few hundred
million dollars. One week later, the Nasdaq peaked, eventually sending its stock
down to a dollar a share. But over 25 years later, Booking Holdings has scaled
over 1000x into an over $100 billion dollar global travel behemoth. Elad Gil is
joined by Booking Holdings CEO Glenn Fogel to discuss his career, from law
school and Wall Street to working at Priceline through the dot-com crash, and to
helping grow the business into a multifaceted, dynamic travel marketplace in the
AI era. Glenn explains how leveraging AI and agents such as Priceline’s ‘Penny’
makes travel planning and customer service better, while emphasizing the
importance of preserving some human support for some users. He also talks about
Booking’s strategy of reinvesting over $700 million into AI and other
technologies while still offering stock buybacks and dividends, the durability
of their scale and complexities of dealing with a large portfolio physical
properties across the world, and why upskilling is so important for employees
amid concerns about AI-driven job displacement.
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Chapters:
00:00 – Cold Open
00:05 – Glenn Fogel Introduction
00:41 – Glenn’s Early Career
06:49 – Lessons from the Early Internet
09:24 – Deciding Factors for Exiting
10:56 – Travel Through the Lens of AI
13:30 – Agentic Travel Planning
18:59 – Agents, Token Economics, and ROI
22:46 – Booking’s Capital Investment Philosophy
25:23 – Scale as Durable Asset
29:40 – Purpose and Choosing Wisely
33:18 – AI’s Impact on Jobs
36:38 – Upskilling in the AI Era
38:36 – Public Perception of AI
40:24 – Conclusion
Highlights
Highlights
In this podcast, Booking Holdings CEO Glenn Fogel shares his journey from joining Priceline during the dot-com crash to leading a $100 billion travel giant. He discusses the parallels between the early internet era and today's AI wave, emphasizing that no company has a permanent competitive advantage and that constant innovation is key.
Chapters
Chapters
Cold Open
00:00Glenn Fogel Introduction
00:05Glenn’s Early Career
00:41Lessons from the Early Internet
06:49Deciding Factors for Exiting
09:24Travel Through the Lens of AI
10:56Agentic Travel Planning
13:30Agents, Token Economics, and ROI
18:59Booking’s Capital Investment Philosophy
22:46Scale as Durable Asset
25:23Purpose and Choosing Wisely
29:40AI’s Impact on Jobs
33:18Upskilling in the AI Era
36:38Public Perception of AI
38:36Conclusion
40:24Transcript
Transcript
Glenn Fogel: There is no such thing as a moat. There is no such thing as somewhere you're going to be protected against innovation. Today, we have a competitive advantage on areas, Absolutely, But those can go away tomorrow. The only one to win long term i...

