Disruption Comes to Lifestyle Hotels in the Form of On-Demand Meeting Spaces

Bizly has launched as an iOS app platform for users seeking last-minute meeting space at luxury and lifestyle hospitality brands, ranging from Mandarin Oriental to the Standard, Morgans, and Ace hotel groups. A web and Android version are scheduled to launch in the first quarter of 2016. There's growing demand globally for remote corporate meeting space due to the rise in corporate workers on the go and contract freelancers. At the same time, hotel meeting space at upscale properties often goes unused for small events because it's generally perceived as an expensive hassle to book in major urban markets. In recent years, major hotel chains have been trying to bridge the gap between short-term meeting demand and empty meeting space by developing branded services to drive late bookings. Hilton launched Meetings Simplified; Marriott created Workspace on Demand in partnership with LiquidSpace, and Westin offers its Tangent all-in-one telepresence rooms. Bizly, meanwhile, is t