Sourav Ghosh, EVP, CFO and treasurer at Host Hotels & Resorts, Inc. (Nasdaq: HST), participated in a video interview in conjunction with REITwise 2021: Nareit’s Law, Accounting & Finance Conference.
Ghosh discussed a REITwise general session that he moderated titled “Leveraging Technology to Drive Shareholder and Stakeholder Value.” He said that technology today allows REITs to process and create insights from a huge amount of data in all forms.
“At Host Hotels, our IBM Watson predictive analytics model mines over one million structured data points and three million unstructured data points to help us anticipate which hotel markets are likely to outperform, versus underperforming in the medium- to long-term,” Ghosh said.
Ghosh added that technology can meaningfully enhance asset values by either improving the topline, reducing operating expenses, or doing a combination of both that ultimately enhances overall operating performance.
Turning to the pandemic, Ghosh said it has created an opportunity to completely reassess the interoperating model.
“Customer expectations will evolve, and we must consider how technology can be integrated into the operation to more efficiently and effectively deliver superior customer experiences,” he said.
More videos from REITwise 2021: Nareit’s Law, Accounting & Finance Conference: