There’s a familiar rhythm to corporate travel. Book the flight, tick the policy box, and hope nothing goes wrong somewhere over the Pacific.
Artificial intelligence, it seems, has other ideas.
At this year’s Business Travel Show Asia Pacific, returning to Singapore’s Marina Bay Sands on 14–15 April, the industry won’t just be talking about AI, it will be quietly admitting it’s already embedded in the machinery.
And not in the polite, “How can I help you?” sort of way.
The shift from reactive to quietly in charge
For years, AI has hovered around the edges of corporate travel, answering queries, suggesting fares, and occasionally behaving itself.
Now it’s stepping forward, or more accurately, stepping in.
New market research suggests 66 per cent of corporates plan to roll out AI-driven tools across booking, pricing and expense systems within six years. That’s not experimentation. That’s structural change.
The real story, though, isn’t automation. It’s anticipation.
Vibhav Singh of Amex GBT Consulting sums it up neatly:
“Looking ahead, we will see more proactive, ‘agentic’ experiences where AI shifts from simply responding to requests to actively supporting travellers in the background, such as monitoring disruptions and helping re-accommodate trips when needed, with seamless escalation to a human when it matters most.”
In plain English: the system starts fixing problems before the traveller even knows they exist.
Flights delayed? Already rebooked.
Visa expiring? Already flagged.
Connections blown? Already solved.
All very impressive and just slightly unnerving.
Personalisation that actually means something
The industry has been promising “personalised travel” for years, usually meaning little more than remembering your seat preference.
AI, to its credit, is beginning to deliver something closer to the real thing.
Geert de Boo from JTB Business Travel points to itineraries shaped by behaviour, not guesswork.
“We are implementing AI to improve the traveller experience, guiding towards more relevant and personalised itinerary-building, based on an understanding of travellers’ preferences and past travel patterns.”
In other words, fewer irrelevant options, more intuitive journeys and perhaps fewer late-night booking frustrations for travel managers.
It’s efficient, sensible and, one suspects, long overdue.
The uncomfortable truth: efficiency isn’t trust
But here’s where the industry hesitates, and rightly so.
AI can solve problems. What it hasn’t yet mastered is reassurance.
Eugene Tan of Trip.Biz doesn’t sugar-coat it:
“The biggest impact this year is the transition from assistive AI to agentic AI. AI is no longer just a chatbot that answers questions; it is evolving into a proactive agent that anticipates disruptions and executes complex tasks autonomously.”
Then comes the reality check:
“This rapid shift has also created a ‘trust gap.’ Many of our clients are explicitly worried that AI is being used as a tool for deflection: to replace the real human agents they rely on in a crisis. AI generates efficiency, but only people generate trust.”
It’s a line worth pinning to every boardroom wall.
Because when things go wrong and in travel, they always do eventually, nobody asks to speak to the algorithm.
Governance: the quiet handbrake
If trust is the emotional hurdle, governance is the practical one.
Kerri Homann of Rheinmetall Defence Australia and New Zealand brings a dose of discipline to the discussion.
“While AI has the potential to improve efficiency and insight, our primary focus will be on ensuring that any use of AI across the travel ecosystem is secure, compliant and well governed,” she says.
“Ultimately, the challenge for the industry will be balancing innovation with responsibility, ensuring AI enhances the travel programme while protecting our travellers, our data and our duty of care obligations.”
Translation: move fast, but don’t break anything important like compliance, security or traveller safety.
The innovation parade (with a reality check)
The show itself promises its usual mix of enthusiasm and ambition.
Sessions like “AI in action” and “AI and travel management” will unpack how suppliers and buyers are actually using the technology, not just how they say they are.
Meanwhile, the Innovation Faceoff 2026 will parade five hopeful disruptors, each convinced they’ve solved corporate travel’s biggest headache.
Perhaps one of them has.
More likely, they’re part of a longer evolution one where AI steadily reshapes the edges before redefining the centre.
Jen Bankard of The BTN Group strikes a more measured tone:
“The pace and scale of AI acceleration in the last year has brought both opportunities and important questions… our focus has been on placing AI within the broader context of the industry.”
A polite way of saying: let’s not get carried away.
Asia Pacific sets the pace
With more than 500 buyers and suppliers expected, the event reflects a region moving quickly and thinking seriously about what comes next.
Asia Pacific has always been a proving ground for travel innovation. Now it’s becoming a testing ground for AI at scale.
Not everything will work. Not everything should.
But the direction of travel is clear.
The bottom line
AI is no longer a future add-on for corporate travel. It’s becoming part of the operating system.
It will make journeys smoother, decisions faster, and programmes more efficient.
But it will not replace the one thing travellers still value most when plans unravel at 35,000 feet, a capable human who can step in and sort it out.
The smart operators won’t choose between AI and people.
They’ll make sure one quietly supports the other.
by Maysa Punchanit – (c) 2026.
Read Time: 5 minutes.
About the Author.
Maysa Punchanit has never waited for life to become easy. She’s far too practical for that. Instead, she’s built her path the way many strong women do, step by step, job by job, learning something useful everywhere she’s been.
Her working life has taken her through hospitality, sales, beauty therapy and the fast-moving world of social media, where she partnered with some of Thailand’s best-known companies. Along the way, she discovered a steady voice for blogging, warm, direct and grounded in real experience rather than marketing spin.
Being a single mother sharpened her resolve rather than slowing her stride. If anything, it gave her purpose.
Now with Destination Thailand News and Global Travel Media, Maysa arrives not as a newcomer, but as someone quietly battle-tested, resilient, capable and ready for the next chapter.
