TUI appoints UK head of innovation

TUI UK & Ireland has appointed its first Head of Innovation as it looks to further digitise the business.

Jo Hickson, who joined from Home Retail Group where she spent five years as Group Head of Innovation, will be focused on driving customer focused innovations across TUI UK & Ireland. In her new role, Jo will report to Jeremy Osborne, director of Strategic Business Change and Innovation.

A key part of the role is to run the newly created TUI Holiday Lab, the company’s centre of innovation and collaboration. The Lab is also currently recruiting an additional member, as it looks to add a creative technologist with user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) capabilities to its already entrepreneurially-minded and broad-skilled team.

Launched in March this year, the TUI Holiday Lab is designed to explore and develop new and emerging technologies, and deliver forward-thinking products that will enhance the holiday experience for customers. Since launching the team has introduced the Thomson Apple TV app, which contains videos of the holiday company’s destinations, including Costa Rica and Iceland, and products such as its Sensatori resorts. TUI UK & Ireland was the first UK travel brand to have a presence in the TV app store, and the first travel brand in the world to have an app based on video content.

Leading the innovation team, Hickson will focus on anticipating the next advances in technology and customer behaviour, scanning the horizon for future disruptive trends and innovation opportunities – including natural language processing and virtual reality – and using this to feed a pipeline of innovation projects.

Hickson has a wealth of experience in innovation management. Prior to her time at Home Retail Group, she held the position of Global Product Manager in Telefonica’s Madrid office, responsible for innovation and product and services development.