Travala CEO Juan Otero told CoinDesk in an Oct. 15 interview that the company has added an AI agent for hotel reservations paid through crypto wallets.
Otero said Travala's inventory includes more than 2.2 million hotel listings across over 230 countries. Travelers can tell the agent their destination and lodging preferences; it presents rooms to choose from before prompting them to connect a wallet. The interview said a booking can be completed without an account, a downloaded app or a registered credit card.
Otero described the payment route as a pairing of BNB Chain's machine payment protocol and Binance Pay's settlement service. People can spend assets including Tether (USDT) on BNB Chain, he told CoinDesk. Each transaction requires user approval, with limits set by time and amount; the interview also said private keys are not exposed.
Otero said the service is intended for crypto-focused developers as well as travelers who already use wallets such as MetaMask. In June, Travala introduced a separate tool to help developers build travel agents that make blockchain payments on Base, CoinDesk reported.
A user's first booking through the AI agent comes with an introductory promotion of up to 10% back, paid in BNB and AVA. The offer runs through Travala's AVA Smart Program; the interview placed its membership above 170,000 and said the program is powered by the company's AVA token.
Travala plans to extend the agent to flights, activities and car rentals, Otero said. He said the longer-term aim is for other AI agents to draw on Travala's travel listings and arrange bookings for users.
