Alpitour World: Empowering travel-booking operators with a purpose-built, Azure OpenAI Service assistant

“You don’t usually connect travel companies with the forefront of technology, but that’s where we’ve been since at least 2000. It’s not surprising that we’ve grasped the potential of generative AI so enthusiastically and effectively as a company.”

Francesco Ciuccarelli, Chief Information Officer at leading travel operator Alpitour World, is commenting on his company's highly trained copilot and the benefits it's already bringing to the company. Named AlpiGPT, it has become such an invaluable AI assistant that it is now enthusiastically described by employees as “a trusted colleague”.

“AlpiGPT is revolutionizing our access to information by providing precise and contextualized answers. Our organization’s AI journey reflects what our CEO often says – that we should see ourselves as a technology company that works in the travel sector, not a travel company with an interest in tech,” he remarks.

“And when Microsoft showed us a proof of concept and demonstrated its unique understanding of our IT infrastructure, we knew we had a partner who could help us deliver.”

Drawing on a history of AI development to streamline customer service

Alpitour World is a world-leading travel company offering customers a wide choice of holidays with destinations ranging from its home country of Italy to the rest of the Mediterranean and Europe to the Caribbean, Africa, Latin America, and beyond.

The company also provides its customers with a variety of different itineraries, types of accommodation and a whole host of other options to create a truly memorable travel experience. The company excels in customer service and its highly dedicated team of travel editors guide customers through different possibilities and routinely respond in depth to complex enquiries.

Helping to answer clients’ and salesforce questions is a huge knowledge base of internal travel catalogs which the travel editors regularly consult. However, doing so can often be effort- and time-intensive.

“Our travel editors wanted to have something more practical to answer to all those questions that the booking operators had when talking on the phone to customers. So we started developing a solution together,” explains Ciuccarelli.

Alpitour World is no stranger to using technological advances to transform its business for the better. Ciuccarelli provides some context, with a brief description of that history: “We launched our first experimentations with automation and AI in general in 2018. Then the year after, we created our first organizational unit to develop projects with AI and automation.

“In 2019 we launched our most ambitious transformation program yet called Innova. It aims to completely rebuild our tour operating applications both in terms of infrastructure and software. We also started our journey to full cloud migration.”

In 2020 the company developed its own in-house AI-powered assistants, and the same year Alpitour World started its center for AI excellence. “That was the beginning of AlpiGPT, and Microsoft really supported us from the beginning right through the whole deployment process,” remarks Ciuccarelli.

Experimenting with AI models to find the ideal solution

Ciuccarelli explains how the deployment of the AlpiGPT AI assistant kicked off. “Before we could start, we needed a proof of concept to ensure we had the appropriate components and infrastructure to support them. That’s how we arrived at the decision to embrace Azure OpenAI Service.

“Since the beginning, Microsoft excelled across the board. They provided more dependable security, greater efficiency, and a high quality of services, backed by stringent service level agreements.

“What’s more, Microsoft’s architects supported us in designing and selecting the best options at every iteration,” he concludes.

System integrator Mauden was also key to the success of the project, explains Ciuccarelli. “They have been an essential partner from the beginning of our AI and automation journey, and we’ve very much grown together in that space,” he comments.

“Our relationship with Alpitour World began in 2018, working on the implementation of the assistant to manage travel bookings. Our collaboration has grown over the years - project by project – exploring technological innovations with a focus on artificial intelligence,” explains Daniele Natali, Technology Leader Data, AI & Automation at Mauden.

“When generative AI was introduced into the market, Alpitour World immediately understood its potential as well as the benefits it could derive from this technology. It was natural for Alpitour World to turn to Mauden because we have the same innovation mindset”, he concludes.

After the software and supporting systems had been developed, the AlpiGPT assistant was ready to start learning. “We gradually incorporated progressively more knowledge to see how the system performed. The travel editors played an essential role in deciding if the copilot was providing the correct information that could be relayed to a customer. We had to continually to tweak the model to improve its output.”

Once the answers provided by AlpiGPT, and the proof of concept were vindicated, the team was ready to scale up to the next level. 50 booking operators started using the AI assistant in their day-to-day work, to help them ask questions coming in from the company’s sales channels.

Synthesizing human talent and AI data crunching

Now AlpiGPT is revolutionizing access to information for Alpitour World staff by providing precise and contextualized answers to queries from salespeople and customers.

The company describes the copilot as “the perfect synthesis between the enormous processing capacity of AI and the creative and critical thinking of experienced professionals”.

Thanks to the use of generative AI, staff are now able to cross-reference information, extracting data across structures and destinations, ultimately providing a quick and detailed response. The project is proving to be a valuable ally for frontline employees, who can focus on continuously improving customer management and addressing their requests more effectively.

"Travel editors are empowered by this tool because they don't have to organize information in folders or with metatags. The savings in time and effort are breathtaking,” enthuses Ciuccarelli. Travel editor Sara Chiarotti went so far to say: “we trust AlpiGPT like a flesh and blood colleague.”

In addition to providing considered answers to detailed queries, AlpiGPT is being used to continue to build the company’s knowledge base, ensuring the collaborative relationship between the generative AI app and company employees yields ever more helpful answers for Alpitour World clients.

Technology in its DNA will drive Alpitour World’s future evolution

“Technology is in our DNA, and the advent of AlpiGPT and its increasing uptake by the company ensures that our commitment to the leading edge of innovation will only strengthen and grow,” comments Ciuccarelli.

In his opinion, the growth of AI in the company has been transformative in terms of corporate culture. What’s more, the combination of the company’s burgeoning generative AI expertise and its material assets could be a game changer for the industry. “We have airplanes and hotels on the one hand, and a highly sophisticated digital approach to dealing with customers. The combination of the two could really contribute to shape our sector in the coming years. In this process, however, the role of our colleagues remains central: they are professionals who know how to use technology with rationality and experience. Without these aspects AI would just be a tool,” he says.

Looking to the future, the company has already identified a staggering 98 use cases for its generative AI platform. They are in three areas: personalization, automation in the company’s contact center, and further enhancements and evolution of the AlpiGPT.

This dedication to developing technology for future innovation is helping to both keep current employees and attract additional talent. “Working with exciting and powerful new tech is helping us to retain staff while making us a very attractive prospect for valuable new joiners,” enthuses Ciuccarelli.