He came up with the sleep service in first class at British Airways. Now he's building AI that predicts what you want to book before you even search. This conversation will change how you think about travel, technology, and leadership.

Andy Owen Jones has spent 35+ years at the cutting edge of travel technology — from British Airways and Virgin Atlantic to founding SmartSeer, a company using predictive AI to transform how online travel works. In this episode of The Free Lunch Podcast, Eddie Ross sits down with his former Amadeus colleague to explore how AI is reshaping the travel industry, why most online travel agencies missed their biggest opportunity, and what leaders need to understand about probability and uncertainty.

Whether you're in travel, tech, or leadership — this one's packed with insights.

🕐 TIMESTAMPS00:00 — Introduction01:22 — Starting at British Airways as a programmer in 198802:32 — The flat bed idea: changing first class from luxury to sleep05:23 — Leaving travel for NatWest and Deloitte06:10 — Learning change management in San Francisco07:30 — Running IT at Virgin Atlantic before Y2K08:06 — Building an online travel agency during the dot-com boom09:01 — Arriving at Amadeus and saving the Tui deal10:23 — How caching and "big data" transformed travel search11:24 — Founding BD4: modelling individual user behaviour14:05 — Moving from certainty to probability-based personalisation16:37 — SmartSeer's pitch: the right product for the right person19:03 — Predictive AI vs generative AI — what's the real difference22:14 — His 2017 AI presentation that nobody cared about23:50 — Will AI be a game changer or a game massager for travel?25:14 — Why online travel agencies never used the data they had29:05 — Is AI actually going to change things radically?32:16 — The real disruption timeline: 2-3 years out34:35 — The age of the niche entrepreneur36:52 — The hidden cost of AI nobody talks about39:28 — Security nightmares and the wrapper startup trap43:35 — Micro-businesses, universities, and the future of work48:13 — Why doctors might train completely differently in 20 years49:49 — Amazon's soulless shops and why humans still matter54:04 — What education should look like now57:16 — Leadership in the age of AI: storytelling, vision, and poker01:01:14 — "Find the right customer for your product, not the right product for your customer"

🔑 KEY TOPICSAI in travel, predictive AI vs generative AI, travel technology evolution, online travel agencies, personalisation, British Airways flat bed history, SmartSeer, change management, leadership in uncertainty, future of education, entrepreneurship, probability thinking

🎙️ ABOUT THE GUESTAndy Owen Jones is co-founder and Managing Director of SmartSeer, a travel technology company using predictive AI to personalise the online travel experience. He previously held senior roles at British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, Amadeus, and founded BD4.

🔗 CONNECT

Andy Owen Jones on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aowenjones/

SmartSeer: https://www.smartseer.com

Eddie Ross on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/eddie-ross-3350711/

📌 ABOUT THE FREE LUNCH PODCASTThe Free Lunch is where we have engaging and useful conversations about leadership in all its different forms. New episodes weekly.

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