GSAIR 2023 : AMERICAS 14
Hospitality Tech
Question and Answer
With Alex Chatzieleftheriou Chief Executive Officer Blueground
Alex , please could you illustrate your initial work and life experience prior to the establishment of Blueground ?
I grew up near Athens , Greece . As a kid I enjoyed competitive games and I like to believe I was always forward-thinking and eager to apply my penchant for strategy games to problem-solving opportunities in the real world .
After graduating from college , I was eager to kick off my growth trajectory in a way that would offer ample learning and impact , and I landed atop the consulting world . I was fortunate to spend 6 years working as a strategy consultant for McKinsey & Company , in between also completing my MBA in INSEAD . Amidst the consulting environment I had access to an array of challenging projects and a culture that thrives on ongoing mentorship and feedback . After years of learning to tackle clients ’ problems across a cross-section of sectors , I was ready to dig deeper operationally into the inner workings of an organisation . This meant moving from an advisory role to an in-house role . This took me to Seoul , Korea where I got to work across the strategy department at the Global HQ of Samsung . While it was great to be on the front-line of such a large organisation , it gave me an itch to start conceptualising how I could start to build something of my own . Low and behold , the wheels started turning for a ‘ Blueground ’ to come !
What inspired you to found Blueground ? Was there a particular hospitality problem you were looking to solve or a gap in the market which you identified ?
Living out of hotels in 12 different cities as a consultant and seeing the difficulties in renting high quality furnished apartments led me to co-found Blueground in 2013 .
There were a few significant experiences that I noticed at the time :
• It was nearly impossible to find a fully-furnished apartment ready when I needed it and for the duration of time , I needed it for .
• Renting a fully-furnished apartment was tedious and time-consuming . It involved a manual process - with endless administration and multiple involved parties without technology enablement . It also came with inflexible terms and predominantly unfurnished apartments .
• I also recognised the significant expense my company was investing for me , and others , to stay in hotels for months at a time . And quite simply , I never felt really at home staying in hotels over apartments .
I founded Blueground to address this unmet need for high-quality furnished stays of one month or more . Blueground makes renting easy through a completely tech-enabled search and booking process and under flexible contract terms . Now renters can book high quality homes where they want , when they want , and on the terms they want .
Many proptech businesses have harnessed Artificial Intelligence to automate repetitive tasks . How does Blueground use AI / Machine Learning ?
Blueground has integrated AI / ML across various aspects of its operations , resulting in enhanced efficiency , improved predictive ability and optimised customer experiences .
For instance , Blueground has leveraged AI / ML in identifying patterns in customer feedback for quality improvement purposes , in predicting revenue and profitability of our apartments , and in detecting accounts with risk of churning . We also leverage AI / ML to analyse large data sets in order to find patterns and ensure data alignment . Furthermore , AI contributes to increased productivity for our Engineering teams by acting as a coding co-pilot . In Blueground ’ s communications , generative AI aids in improving written communication for non-native English speakers . It plays a crucial role in generating personalised property descriptions at scale with a goal of making it appealing to prospective tenants . We also leverage AI for image processing , video tours , and 3D rendering following specific criteria .