The Tech Blog Writer Podcast - Inspired Tech Startup Stories & Interviews With Tech Leaders, Entrepreneurs And Innovators

Here’s the thing. Most of us still picture a hotel lobby with a counter, a queue, and someone typing furiously while we wait after a long flight. In this episode, I sit with Richard Valtr, founder of Mews, to ask whether that scene is quietly fading. Backed by Tiger Global, Goldman Sachs, and Battery Ventures, Mews recently raised 75 million dollars to scale an AI-powered platform that already processes more than 10 billion dollars in payments each year. Richard argues the real bottleneck in hospitality isn’t software. It’s mindset. If hotels rethought workflows around guests rather than systems, the front desk would feel less like a checkpoint and more like a welcome. Richard shares the origin story of building for hoteliers as well as guests, and why the property management system should function like a central nervous system. He explains how automation handles the repetitive pieces of check-in so staff can actually look people in the eye and start a conversation. That’s the promise of AI here. Not gimmicks