Tawanda Simango argues that AI is quietly becoming a hotel distribution channel in its own right, and that the industry's commercial playbook now has to be paired with a governance one.
AI as a new distribution layer
Two moves in September 2026 make the shift concrete. Marriott CEO Anthony Capuano flagged that the biggest impact of AI on hotels may land on the distribution landscape, and the group is already feeding richer property data to Google and OpenAI so its hotels surface accurately in AI-driven discovery. In parallel, SiteMinder's Demand Plus proposition, together with DirectBooker as its inaugural AI demand partner, is opening a route for hotels to be discovered inside ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini with live rates, availability, and a path back to direct booking.
SiteMinder's Changing Traveller Report 2026 backs the trend. AI usage for accommodation research is up almost fourfold year on year, 80% of travellers want some form of AI capability during their booking journey, and journeys are increasingly non-linear – 26% start on an OTA and 18% of those still book direct. The takeaway: discovery and conversion no longer have to happen in the same place, and an "AI-to-direct-booking" pathway is emerging.
Governance is now a commercial question
Fresh from ISO/IEC 42001 training, Simango argues that as AI systems recommend hotels, influence pricing, target segments, and increasingly act, the questions of accountability, transparency, data quality, and human oversight stop being IT concerns and become commercial ones. For African hospitality in particular, the challenge is to create economic value from intelligence without importing governance-free strategies built for global chains.
His bottom line: the winning hotels won't be those with the most AI, but those that create the most value from it and govern it responsibly.