The founders of visitor journey administration app Pana are returning to the company journey area subsequent 12 months with a brand new visitor journey administration app, Juno, for which they’re already constructing a pilot group.
Devon Tivona, former Pana CEO and cofounder alongside Sam Felsenthal, had been on sabbatical from the company journey trade since Could, when he left his position as head of journey and expense for Coupa, which had acquired Pana a number of years prior. Pana already had spun down its Pana Visitor capabilities, which earned it each the Innovator of the Yr and Folks’s Alternative awards at BTN’s Innovation Faceoff in 2019. It as an alternative was serving as the bottom know-how for Coupa’s newly launched journey reserving module—which Coupa final summer season introduced that it will part out over the course of the following 12 months.
Because the timeline for the Pana platform winds down, Tivona stated he and Felsenthal had been listening to from former prospects searching for a alternative for Pana. Whereas some journey administration corporations have launched visitor administration options within the meantime, the shoppers informed them that nothing had fairly stuffed the void from Pana’s departure from the area, he stated.
“They informed us there was nothing that had the prescriptive, guided end-to-end nature of what we had constructed, which solved a whole lot of the normal ache factors with visitor journey,” Tivona stated. “We stated if the chance continues to be there, and prospects nonetheless want us to construct an answer, we’ll simply construct it once more, however stronger, higher and sooner than earlier than.”
Tivona and Felsenthal plan to launch that resolution, Juno, within the second quarter of 2025, dealing with the ache factors of coordinating and reserving visitor journey in addition to the monetary aspect of visitor traveler administration. Juno shouldn’t be going to easily be Pana 2.0, nonetheless, as it should incorporate the teachings Tivona and Felsenthal discovered the primary time round with Pana—which itself was not initially launched as a visitor journey resolution, Tivona stated.
For one, whereas Pana launched first with smaller shoppers and labored its means as much as bigger prospects, Juno will likely be “enterprise-ready on day one,” Tivona stated. Juno will likely be an “open platform” capable of work with any journey administration firm, however as a result of TMC integrations “take some time,” it should launch with a “pre-integrated” TMC associate, which Tivona stated is at the moment within the last choice course of.
“Prospects can have the choice to contract with Juno for each the know-how and the service,” he stated. “Or, in the event that they need to convey their very own TMC alongside, they’ll, however that is in all probability late 2025 or 2026, as a result of we’re engaged on TMC timelines then.”
Juno’s service technique additionally will differ from Pana’s, Tivona stated. When Pana launched, TMCs didn’t have the chat service capabilities they’ve at present, so Pana employed its personal staff of brokers—about 150 at its peak—to service shoppers through chat. Now that TMC chat capabilities have advanced, Juno will likely be “targeted on being a know-how firm,” letting TMC companions deal with the chat servicing factor. As an added benefit, that may allow service to escalate to a human agent when essential throughout journey disruptions, he stated.
“Again within the Pana days, we did not do telephones,” Tivona stated. “We have been millennials who believed that all the things could possibly be resolved by means of chat, and we’re gracefully saying we have been mistaken. Once you’re stranded in an airport, and also you need to communicate to an actual human being, you must have the ability to entry that.”
Nevertheless, Tivona stated that Juno is coming with the concept that 95 p.c or extra of journeys will likely be “only a know-how expertise” for vacationers, wherein they’re guided by means of the reserving and expense course of, with easy adjustments and primary questions capable of be triaged by AI.
On the funds aspect, Juno has a monetary product referred to as the Juno Spend Account, a single account from which an organization will get a month-to-month bill. That account can cowl air, floor and incidentals, and the shopper pays the bill and add the CSV file to their ERP.
Even with enterprise shoppers in focus at Juno’s launch, the plan is to “work with throughout the spectrum,” Tivona stated. “A few of our high-growth prospects wanted a visitor software earlier than they wanted a transient journey software, as a result of they have been a younger firm and have been nonetheless getting away with expense experiences however had a logistical ache on the recruiting aspect.”
Tivona stated about half of the slots for pilot prospects have been stuffed, so he is nonetheless bringing in a restricted variety of extra pilot prospects. “We do not need to settle for too many purchasers on day one to ensure we give them an ideal expertise,” he stated.
The identify Juno is also a little bit of a callback to Pana, Tivona stated. As “pana” is used for a buddy and confidante in lots of Latin American areas, referring to the app’s mission as somebody to assist a traveler on the highway, Juno carries that concept into Roman mythology. “Juno was the queen of the Roman gods and generally known as the protector of Rome, so we linked this concept of a guardian watching over our vacationers as they’re on the highway,” he stated.
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