British Airways Is Ripping Out 52 Seats to Make Room for Premium

0:00Music

0:10Airbnb is quietly rebuilding its luxury program. British Airways is ripping 52 seats out of its biggest plane, and a look inside a Hotel Tech Star's$2.5 billion valuation. Welcome back to the Skift Daily Briefing. This is Bailey Schulz, Skift's global tourism reporter. It's Wednesday, October 27th. Let's get into it. First up, Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky told hosts at Airbnb's invitation-only summit last month that the company is rebuilding its high-end homes program. That's according to two property managers who are in the room. Airbnb hasn't announced the renewed push into luxury accommodations and declined to comment.

0:50Airbnb launched a luxury accommodation program called Lux in 2019 with a dedicated trip designer on every booking. When the pandemic hit, Airbnb cut a quarter of its staff and halted investment in several areas. The new version has a real bar. A slide from the summit lays out the standards. Extraordinary design, including an updated kitchen and bath finishes, an upscale neighborhood, and amenities like a private washer and dryer. If a listing passes review, Airbnb sends someone to inspect the home in person. One attendee expects it to stay, quote, pretty tight and exclusive. Next up, British Airways wants fewer people on its Airbus A380s.

1:28The refurbished jets drop from 469 seats to 417. The entire upper deck becomes club world business class, with 106 suites. British Airways is calling it the world's largest business class cabin. Premium economy grows by more than 50 % to 84 seats. Overall, premium cabins go from about 35 % of the plane to 48%. Here's why this matters. Heathrow slots are some of the scarcest assets in aviation. British Airways can't just add a flight when premium demand spikes, so it's changing who sits behind each slot. And premium pays. On Delta, those cabins now bring in half of passenger revenue. Virgin Atlantic's CEO says premium demand is, quote, insatiable.

2:09But there's a possible catch. Airlines committed to much of this during a strong demand stretch. The next test is whether those customers keep paying once the economics get tougher. And finally, Skift dug into the filings behind Muse, a hotel tech company valued at$2.5 billion. Muse started with property management software in 2012 and now calls itself an operating system for hotels after expanding into payments, point of sale, revenue management, housekeeping, and AI. Revenue grew 39 % last year to about$329 million. Roughly three quarters of that came from transactions, not software subscriptions.

2:45About$19 billion moved to the platform, but building the broader company remains expensive. Muse posted an operating loss of around$125 million, and its break-even target keeps getting pushed back. At roughly eight times the revenue, Muse's$250 billion revenue assumes the economics get better as Muse grows. That's it for your Skift Daily Briefing. For the latest travel industry news, visit skift.com and sign for our newsletter at skift.com backslash daily. Thank you.