Google has "absolutely no intention of entering the booking space"

Nigel Huddleston, head of Google Travel, said Tuesday at the ABTA Convention in Palma that the company has "absolutely no intention of entering the booking space, that is the space of travel agents", that he called "partners", and proposed an effort in developing applications for mobile phones because they are "the future of travel", in his opinion.

Google has launched three new products targeted to travelers, with mobile applications. Google Goggles, available for Android and iPhone, gives instant useful information about a place, just by photographing it. Google Voice Search transcribes the human voice and performs the appropriate search. And Google Translate makes immediate translations online. All these services are free.

Huddleston said that "an incredible speed of search result" is one of the keys to the possible advantage of the Travel division of the giant Google over its competitors, thanks to technology from ITA.

Google Flight Search and Google Hotel Finder are still a “work in progress” and are being tested in the U.S., according to Nigel Huddleston, who has assured that the intention of the dominant search engine is to perform an "international expansion". Chances are that the implementation abroad will begin in theUK, but quickly move to other neighbour countries, as the head of Google Travel has told preferente.com.