Amadeus EMEA’s Maher Koubaa on the AI reshaping travel and the barriers that remain
The EVP – Travel Unit and MD EMEA at Amadeus IT Group shares how AI will reshape search, booking and disruption management
21 August, 2026
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Artificial intelligence has become the travel industry’s favourite talking point, but the harder question is where it actually changes the journey, and how soon. Amadeus, the travel-technology group whose systems sit behind much of the world’s flight search, booking and airline operations, has made AI a central focus, from acquisitions to a push into so-called agentic tools that can act on a traveller’s behalf rather than simply answer questions.
The Middle East is a natural test bed. Carriers across the region are expanding fast and investing hard in digital experience, even as the fundamentals of personalisation, clean data, connected systems, and trusted infrastructure remain a work in progress everywhere.
We spoke with Maher Koubaa, executive vice president, Travel Unit and MD EMEA at Amadeus IT Group, about how AI will reshape search, booking and disruption management first; why “personalisation at scale” is still so difficult; what happens to airlines, OTAs and booking platforms when the interface becomes conversational; how digitally native travellers are shifting expectations; and where AI and analytics fit into aviation’s tightening sustainability goals.
Amadeus has been investing heavily in AI, including acquisitions like SkyLink and broader AI-powered travel capabilities. How do you see AI reshaping the travel experience over the next three to five years, and which parts of the journey, search, booking, disruption management, or in-trip services, will feel the impact first in a meaningful way?
AI is expected to reshape the travel experience by making it more conversational, personalised and responsive across the journey. In the near term, the biggest impact will likely be felt in areas where travellers need faster support and where airlines manage high volumes of repetitive or complex interactions.
Search and trip planning will be one of the first areas to change meaningfully. Instead of using fixed search boxes and filters, travellers will increasingly be able to describe what they want in natural language and receive more relevant options based on their intent, preferences and context.
Booking and servicing will also evolve. Agentic AI can help airlines move from basic chatbots that answer questions to AI agents that can act within airline-defined boundaries, for example helping a traveller change a flight, identify the booking, propose alternatives, explain fare differences and initiate payment.
Disruption management is another immediate use case. During delays, cancellations or major operational events, airlines need to respond to large numbers of passengers quickly and personally. AI agents can help scale that response while escalating more complex or sensitive cases to human teams.
Over the next three to five years, the travel experience should feel less fragmented. AI will support a more connected journey across inspiration, booking, servicing, disruption support and post-trip engagement, but this will depend on strong data foundations, trusted systems and responsible governance.
The industry has been talking about personalised retailing and NDC for several years, but adoption remains uneven. What progress are you seeing among airlines in the Middle East specifically, and what is still holding back true scale when it comes to dynamic, personalised travel offers?
The direction of travel is clear: airlines want to move from generic offers and broad segmentation towards more dynamic, personalised retailing. The Middle East is particularly relevant because airlines in the region are investing heavily in growth, customer experience and digital transformation.
However, true personalisation at scale remains difficult. One of the biggest barriers is data fragmentation. Traveller information often sits across multiple systems, including CRM, loyalty, digital, passenger service and order management platforms. Without a unified view of the traveller, it is difficult to personalise offers in a meaningful and consistent way.
Another challenge is operational complexity. As airline retailing becomes more sophisticated, rules-based approaches can become difficult to manage. The report notes that one airline customer would have needed to manage 17,000 unique rules to match product bundles to customer segments. AI can help by using data and machine learning to propose more relevant offers or actions in real time, rather than relying only on manual rules.
NDC and new retailing systems are important foundations, but technology alone is not enough. Airlines also need high-quality data, system compatibility, governance, and the ability to connect AI with trusted systems of record. In the Middle East, the opportunity is significant because the region is building for scale, but the same fundamentals apply: personalisation depends on the strength of the underlying data and technology architecture.
As AI evolves from recommendation tools to more autonomous agents, do you see a future where travellers delegate full trip planning and booking to AI systems? How might that reshape the role of airlines, OTAs, and GDS platforms?
Yes, we do see a future where travellers delegate more of the planning and booking process to AI systems, but it will happen gradually rather than overnight. The report shows that AI is already mainstream in travel planning, but usage today is still mainly assistive. Only a small share of travellers currently rely on AI to handle most of their travel planning, which shows that trust, control and reliability still matter.
As agentic AI matures, travellers may increasingly ask AI assistants to plan an entire trip, compare options, recommend flights, hotels and services, and eventually help complete bookings. This changes the role of airlines, OTAs and travel technology platforms. Airlines will need to make sure their offers are visible, accurate and bookable through AI channels, while also protecting their brand, customer relationship and commercial strategy.
OTAs and travel sellers will need to think about how they add value when the interface becomes conversational and intent-led. GDS and travel technology platforms will remain important because AI still needs access to trusted, dynamic travel data and reliable transaction infrastructure. AI may recommend or orchestrate the journey, but the underlying booking, payment and servicing processes still need to be executed securely and accurately through trusted systems.
So the future is not about AI replacing the travel ecosystem. It is about AI becoming a new interface and orchestration layer on top of the ecosystem.
Amadeus’ travel trends research points to rising demand for hyper-personalisation and AI-assisted trip planning. How are expectations changing among younger, digitally native travellers, and what does that mean for how airlines, hotels, and destinations design and package travel?
Younger, digitally native travellers expect travel to feel more intuitive, relevant and responsive. They are used to digital experiences that understand context and reduce friction, so they are less tolerant of generic offers, static information and complicated processes.
The reports point to a broader shift: travellers want experiences and products that are tailored to the specific trip, not simply added as a generic extra. In travel protection, for example, younger travellers show stronger interest when coverage is personalised and relevant to the nature of the trip. The same principle applies more broadly across travel retailing.
For airlines, hotels and destinations, this means packaging needs to become more contextual. Travellers may not just want a flight or a hotel room; they want a trip that fits their purpose, budget, timing, preferences and risk profile. AI can help by interpreting intent, bringing together data from different systems, and creating offers that are more relevant to the individual traveller.
This also means communication needs to be clearer. Travellers expect plain-language explanations, real-time support and transparent options. Whether it is a flight bundle, an upgrade, a hotel offer or travel protection, the value needs to be easy to understand at the moment of decision.
Sustainability targets are tightening across aviation. How is technology, particularly AI and advanced analytics, helping airlines optimise operations such as routing, fuel efficiency, and load factors while maintaining commercial performance?
Technology can support sustainability by helping airlines make better, faster and more data-driven operational and commercial decisions. While the report does not focus specifically on sustainability, it does show how agentic AI and advanced analytics can help airlines optimise complex workflows and improve efficiency.
For example, AI can support operational teams by monitoring performance, simulating scenarios, recommending actions and helping coordinate decisions across traditionally siloed functions. This is relevant to areas such as disruption management, turnaround, capacity planning and operational control.
On the commercial side, AI can help revenue management and marketing teams understand demand signals more quickly and optimise route promotion and load factors. The report highlights AI-powered marketing tools that can identify which routes to promote, link commercial KPIs to market signals such as hotel occupancy and competition, and optimise campaign execution.
The sustainability link is that more efficient operations can reduce waste, improve resource utilisation and support better planning. At the same time, airlines need to maintain commercial performance, so the opportunity is not simply to reduce activity, but to use data and AI to make smarter decisions across operations, capacity and demand.
