International Hospitality Media has announced the launch the Short-Term Rentalz conference, to run concurrently with Serviced Apartment Summit Europe 2016 in London.
Designed to stimulate debate and foster the sharing of knowledge about one of the fastest growing and most vibrant business sectors anywhere in the world, the inaugural Short-Term Rentalz will take place at the Park Plaza Victoria hotel in London on July 13 2016, running concurrently with the market-leading Serviced Apartment Summit Europe.
The vacation rental industry is currently worth about $100 billion annually, while Research and Markets believes that, with growing global awareness, this figure will reach $169.7 billion by 2019.
Airbnb, the best-known player in the sector, was founded in 2008 and is active in 34,000 cities in 190 countries. It has over a million listings on its platform and has seen more than 30 million room nights booked. Airbnb’s latest funding round raised $1.5 billion USD valuing the company at $25.5 billion USD.
The launch of Short-Term Rentalz comes as major hospitality companies around the world are investing in short-term rental platforms. Recent examples include Hyatt’s £40 million investment stake in Onefinestay and Accor’s 30% stake in Oasis Collections, and investment in Squarebreak. Choice Hotels has gone one step further with its plans to launch its own vacation rental platform.
Piers Brown, CEO of event organiser International Hospitality Media, said: “The short-term rental sector has become a red-hot topic across the hospitality industry. It is regularly debated at our conferences and others, so we thought it was time the UK had its very own event for this innovative and exciting market. We look forward to establishing another strongly branded, sector-leading event, and exploring the synergies between the short-term rental markets and the others we operate in, which include serviced apartments, boutique and lifestyle hotels and hybrid hotels and hostels.”
The inaugural event will run concurrently with Serviced Apartment Summit Europe, and delegates can attend both events for the price of one ticket. Brown said: “While the wider hotel market has until very recently been largely dismissive of Airbnb and its peers, the serviced apartment sector has seen some of the benefits short-tern rentals can bring them, and are beginning to embrace it. Not only have these platforms raised awareness of the apartment-stay concept over a traditional hotel room, they are also being used as an effective and economical short-stay inventory distribution alternative to OTAs. There is a distinct synergy between serviced apartments and short-tern rentals so we are delighted to launch our new event in tandem with the Serviced Apartment Summit.”
Topics to be debated at Short-Term Rentalz include:
• The impact of short-term rental on business travel
• An overview of the short-term rental industry: Past, present and future
• Regulation and legal update
• Hospitality convergence: Short term rentals v Hotels v Serviced Apartments v Hostels
• Investment
• Distribution and demand
• Software and technology
To see the agenda and buy tickets, click here.
For more information, and for sponsorship, speaker and exhibition stand enquries, please call +44 (0)208 340 5989
+44 (0)208 340 5989 or email info@internationalhospitality.media</p
