Skift Travel News Blog

Cendyn, a software company that offers customer relationship management, digital marketing, and operations tools to hotels, has hired a new chief executive. 

The company said Monday that Jack Blaha has taken the role for the Florida-based company. He replaces Tim Sullivan, who had started as CEO in June 2020, a year after the company gained new ownership.

Accel-KKR, a technology-focused private equity firm based in Silicon Valley, became the majority owner of Cendyn in June 2019 through an undisclosed investment. 

Cendyn acquired Rainmaker, a hotel revenue management service, shortly after with that financial support. It acquired NextGuest, a long-time rival, in February 2021. Cendyn also in the last year merged with Pegasus, a central reservation system that had merged in 2019 with Travel Tripper with backing from Accel-KKR

And Cendyn acquired DigitalHotelier last year to expand its distribution and eCommerce capabilities. 

In addition to those business deals over the past couple of years, Cendyn said it has expanded in India and Asia Pacific. Cendyn said it has tens of thousands of customers in 143 countries

Blaha has previously worked for tech companies including Khoros, Lone Wolf Technologies, PeopleAdmin, and Aptean.

Cendyn said that Blaha will lead plans for continued strategic growth as hotels, resorts, and casinos invest in integrated technology and digitization.

The hotel tech services company owned by hotel giant Accor is strengthening its offerings through the acquisition of a digital marketing agency. 

Accor-owned D-Edge said this week that it has acquired Equaero, a Paris company that uses a proprietary software platform for marketing campaign tracking and reporting. 

Equaero is now a wholly owned subsidiary of D-Edge. It will continue being led by its founder and CEO, Jean-Dominique Brivet, who will report to D-Edge CEO Pierre-Charles Grob. All Equaero employees are expected to maintain their roles, according to a D-Edge spokesperson.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

D-Edge’s hotel offerings include central reservation software, a guest management system and more. The company has historically offered some digital advertising services to hotels through a partnership with Equaero. With the acquisition, those capabilities will become in-house services that D-Edge offers. 

Equaero has experience in digital strategy for very large accounts, which will be helpful as D-Edge further develops services for hotel chains, the company said. 

“As online sales continue to grow in the hotel industry, D-Edge — through its website development and digital media offerings — is already helping hoteliers drive more traffic to their websites and convert this traffic into more direct bookings,” D-Edge said in a statement. “By adding new capabilities and talents, D-Edge completes its service offering — [search engine optimization] to name just one — and provides hoteliers with an exhaustive, multi-channel digital marketing range of services.”

Accor formed D-Edge five years ago after two acquisitions. Grob said earlier this year that D-Edge roughly doubled its number of independent hotel customers during the pandemic, from 6,500 non-Accor hotels in July 2019 to more than 12,500 in April.