SIA subsidy for professors' platform Hospitality, Tourism, Innovation & Technology
In 5 years, the platform aims to grow into a globally renowned knowledge platform, specialising in technological innovation in the hospitality and tourism industry.
The professors’ platform Hospitality, Tourism, Innovation & Technology Experts Network (further HTIT-EN) has been granted a subsidy of 100,000 euros by the SIA. HTIT-EN brings together researchers from five universities of applied sciences in the field of tourism and hospitality. This unique collaboration contributes to technological innovation within the domain of hospitality and tourism. Based on a joint research and innovation agenda, they are working together with local, as well as national and international partners.
Professors from the Dutch public hotel schools, researchers, and technology experts come together to develop a joint research agenda around the question “How can the Dutch hospitality and tourism sector, which has a profound societal presence and encompasses a diverse range of workers and stakeholders, leverage its transversal character to generate extensive societal impact through the utilisation of emerging technological innovations?"
Unique collaboration
The professors from the five initiating institutions join forces with more than 30 professors and researchers from 10 Dutch knowledge institutions within this platform. The participants come from various academic backgrounds, including strategic foresight, engineering, disruptive transformations, digital transformation, design, psychology and the creative industry. The platform builds on commitment from the Centre of Expertise Leisure, Tourism and Hospitality (CELTH), Koninklijke Horeca Nederland (KHN) and is connected to more than 50 SMEs. Through this diversity, the researchers expect to showcase how the hospitality & tourism industry can become an accelerator for technology-driven social impact creation.
"We are the first initiative that unites professors from public Dutch hospitality and tourism schools with a broad array of researchers and industry partners. Together we will engage in practice-based research on the potential of technological innovation in hospitality and tourism. Such a setup is unique on a global scale. We are enthusiastic to create knowledge about how technology can be a catalyst for positive societal impact in hospitality and tourism – and beyond." - Dr. Alexander Lennart Schmidt, Professor of Technological Innovation, Hotelschool The Hague
"The Leisure, Tourism, and Hospitality domain requires cross-cutting technological innovation, considering the impacts and challenges that significant technological developments have on companies and organisations. Great to see that five leading academies in hospitality and tourism and CELTH work together and align their expertise and efforts, with lasting innovation and with that sustainable development of the domain as the ultimate goal." - Menno Stokman, director of Centre of Expertise Leisure, Tourism & Hospitality (CELTH)
If you are an industry partner and interested in collaborating with HTIT-EN, please contact Dr. Alexander Lennart Schmidt via research@hotelschool.nl.