Booking Holdings Bets on Agentic AI to Challenge Big Tech

Booking Holdings is betting that agentic artificial intelligence will give it an edge in travel, Chief Financial Officer Ewout Steenbergen said Thursday at a Goldman Sachs financial conference.

Booking is working on agentic AI that it believes would be more personalized than agentic models that large language models like ChatGPT are developing. Instead of just answering questions, agentic AI is designed to take actions, such as booking a flight or changing a reservation.

Booking already partners with AI heavyweights including OpenAI, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, and Salesforce. But Steenbergen said the company’s goal is to build a more personalized version of the agentic experience than they do, and one that keeps customers coming directly to its platform.

“And if you can get an experience that is as good as some of the LLMs, but maybe more person