STR’s Sarah Duignan joined The Upgrade podcast to discuss global hotel performance highlights from full-year 2025 data, including the huge impact of Formula 1 races in markets such as Abu Dhabi.

Veteran hotel and hospitality consultant Bridget Baker, owner of Bridget Baker Consulting, joins the show to talk about how the U.K. government's November budget has put more pressure on hotel operations across the country.

A&O Hotels & Hostels has expanded its name to include hotels and is pondering the establishment of a premium or luxury hostel brand, so said its CEO Oliver Winter, with its newly acquired hotel, the former DoubleTree by Hilton, Docklands Riverside, likely to be the test case.

China Daily's Mingjie Wang joins "The Upgrade" to discuss the full recovery of Chinese outbound travel demand and how hoteliers can get their market share.

Katharine Le Quesne, managing director at hospitality advisory HoCoSo, joins the podcast to discuss the state of the hotel industry's sustainability initiatives. Despite some pushback in certain parts of the world, sustainability remains a strategic focus of many hotel firms.

STR's William Anns joins the podcast to talk about why Southern Europe continues to shine in terms of hotel performance and dives into how hotels have fared during the recent Oasis tour compared to Taylor Swift's Eras Tour.

Wesam Okasha, managing director of TUI Blue Hotels, joins The Upgrade: EMEA Hospitality News podcast to discuss how TUI has evolved from being solely a package and all-inclusive tourism firm to one with standalone, in-house hotel brands TUI Blue and The Mora.

Kevin Edwards, CEO of Hospitality Technology Advisory, joined The Upgrade: EMEA Hospitality News to discuss the business case for more artificial intelligence in the hotel industry.