IRVINE, CA—The drive to provide better hotel-guest services and increase sustainability is creating synergies between technology and hospitality, Steve Arnold, president/CEO of Pacific Hotel Group LLC, tells GlobeSt.com. As we reported earlier this week, the firm has implemented PressReader HotSpot at all of its hotels and resorts, including all properties within the Meritage Collection—Bacara Resort & Spa, Balboa Bay Resort, Estancia La Jolla Hotel & Spa and the Meritage Resort and Spa. The technology enables guests to receive their news digitally and free of charge, giving them access to more than 3,000 publications, and the capability to connect through any device including smartphones, laptops and tablets. GlobeSt.com spoke with Arnold to discuss the integration of technology into the hospitality sector and where he sees it leading.

GlobeSt.com: What new role is technology playing in the hospitality sector, and how is that role being manifested?

Arnold: I think technology is going to play a very significant role in the hospitality sector moving forward. PressReader is a great platform for guests to get news from their city, country or local area right on property. It's also exciting from a sustainability standpoint. We have about 2,200 hotel rooms companywide, and if you do the math on how many papers we were delivering on any given day, it adds up to 550,000 papers. Many guests walk out of their hotel room and leave the paper there unread, and it's a huge waste. We're excited about PressReader, but equally excited about the elimination of hard-print paper everywhere. That's one example. We still offer local papers in our lobbies, but it's a fraction of what we used to put out, of course. The sustainability piece turned out to be a major bonus in going to digital.

There's a lot of integration coming up, some old and some new. One of the new technologies is Open Table, which people use to make restaurant reservations. Uber is now directly tied to Open Table through a business relationship, so guests can also reserve a car at the same time they're reserving a table. It takes care of two steps at once. This is the latest thing that's happening that we're excited about, especially for our guests in resorts with destination restaurants in the area where they would take a car.

Another item that's starting to make its way into the hospitality sector is keyless check-in, whereby the guest's smartphone becomes their key. It's much like a boarding pass for a flight. Hilton has announced this, but won't implement it until the end of 2015, and we're continuing to meet with other keyless vendors, so this is about to happen within the next year. The guest's key is sent to them electronically along with their room number through a coding process. Of course, not every guest will want that, so we will also do the traditional check-in, but this offers them the option of bypassing the whole check-in procedure.

Also, Apple just announced the new Apple Pay, whereby the Apple watch will have the capability to pay for everything you might pay for electronically and act as a room key in hotels. This is all new technology that we saw at the hospitality tech shows, so it's the latest and the greatest.

GlobeSt.com: What do hotel guests want in terms of technology during their stay?

Arnold: The main thing they want is ease of access to the Internet. It's gotten better as an industry for us over the last year or so, but it used to be when you checked into a hotel, you were rolling the dice to see if you were going to get on the Internet. Now it's much easier. We just rolled out a policy where all guests will have complete access to the Internet without having to use a code or splash pages—there's no restriction. Those restrictions are normally what cause the issue with getting online, and we're upping our bandwidth at all our hotels so slowness isn't an issue. This will apply to groups, meeting attendees and overnight guests: 100% flawless Internet access with no issue. I really think that's what guests are looking for, and we hotel owners and operators need to provide this for them.

GlobeSt.com: What other guest-services trends do you see emerging in the hospitality sector?

Arnold: One trend we're seeing is that check-in is changing. Front desks have gone from a full counter that's chest height and blocks the guests out to more access to the guest and an open feeling. We are developing a hotel in Huntington Beach called Paséa Hotel & Spa, and that's what we want the check-in experience to be there. You still need to have an iPad or front desk to give guests a place to go when they check in, but now we can greet you out front with the iIPad and check you in there vs. the process of standing in line at the front desk. It makes it more of a consumer/guest-friendly experience.

From a trend standpoint, these changes are technology related. Everything from our reservation process to our concierge process is done electronically. You can reserve your room on the Web and we'll send you a link afterward allowing you to book a spa treatment or a trip to Napa Valley. Guests want to do most things online.