March 6th 2013: Novotel Hotels, part of the Accor group, is implementing LobbyFriend™, Quadriga‟s new social network platform, to enhance guest communication and deliver a new guest experience in hotel public areas. LobbyFriend™ is being installed in five properties in Europe: Novotel London Tower Bridge, Novotel Amsterdam City, Novotel Rotterdam Schiedam, Novotel Rotterdam Brainpark and Novotel Den Haag.

David Esseryk, VP Consumer Technology Accor comments, “Our plan is to adopt LobbyFriend™ globally across hundreds of Novotel properties, following the positive results of these trials against a number of different performance criteria. It enables Novotel to build closer relationships with its guests, and also provides the ability to offer special promotions directly in the lobby or via guest mobile devices. This is a smart way to communicate with our guests.”

LobbyFriend™ is the first ever social network platform dedicated to the real-time needs of guests in their immediate location and vicinity. It provides a private, temporary social network for hotels, enabling them to communicate with guests during their stay and connect hotel guests and hotel staff together. Guests benefit from connecting online with other guests, to access a relevant and mobile stream of information about what‟s happening within their hotel or city location, to discover where to go and what to do, as well as benefit from exclusive deals and special offers.

Sabine Kadyss, Global Novotel Product & Communications Director, says, “LobbyFriend™ offers an exciting way to bring our lobby areas to life, providing guests with an enhanced and more social lobby environment. It also offers relevant information, news and special offers, which guests can access wherever they are, in or outside the hotel, via their application. A fun, social, new and modern way of communicating, LobbyFriend™ will appeal to Novotel guests while illustrating the global Novotel Brand Essence.”

Hotel staff will be able to stay directly connected to their guests throughout their stay, via their personal mobile devices as well as via screens in the lobby, communicating a live social stream to engage and attract guests. LobbyFriend™ is easy and economical to implement and simple to use, for guests as well as hotel staff. Guests will be invited to download the free LobbyFriend™ app to their personal device, which is available as a one-time downloadable app for both iOS and Android devices, with support for Blackberry devices available soon. The login process for guests is simple, with the additional benefit of being able to utilize existing Facebook or Twitter login details.

LobbyFriend™ will provide the Novotel hotels with a highly effective form of social digital signage in the lobby area to stream all hotel and relevant city news and events. Staff will be able to post news and information and respond to guest comments, quickly and in real-time, creating a single, consolidated social stream, integrating existing hotel Facebook, Twitter and RSS social feeds. Additionally, the hotels will be able to monetize the solution by advertising their own hotel services as well as those of third party vendors.

According to Roger Taylor, Quadriga‟s CEO, “LobbyFriend™ will provide Novotel with the perfect solution for reaching out to their guests and enabling them to interact with each other, in a fun and engaging manner that is familiar to them. With minimal set-up and investment, LobbyFriend™ presents an easy way for hotels to optimize guest communication, whilst at the same time ensuring guests have the best experience possible during their hotel stay.”

For all enquiries: [email protected]

About Quadriga
Quadriga is the single partner to the global hospitality industry, integrating TV and Mobile communications platforms, Internet, Network and Multi Media solutions to deliver operational efficiencies and new revenue opportunities, enabling customers to better compete in an interactive, interconnected and globally accessible world.

Quadriga has over 30 years experience serving the hospitality sector, supporting 345,000 guest rooms and is the number 1 in Europe and the number 2 globally. The company has unrivalled expertise and over 10 years experience in managing hotel networks, Internet provision and digital IP systems, with over 120,000 Internet rooms .

Through an ever-growing portfolio of products, services and content, proprietary to Quadriga or via „best-in-class‟ partners, Quadriga provides customers with the flexibility and reassurance that they can obtain a complete and relevant technology solution that meets their business revenue, guest satisfaction and operational efficiency targets, all from a single, global partner. Quadriga‟s range of TV and mobile communications platforms, easy-to-use guest Internet solutions, network management, consultancy and delivery services and multimedia content means it can work with its customers to converge today‟s disparate technologies to create a technology ecosystem that delivers unequalled guest service and hotel operational efficiency.

As the hospitality sector expands globally, Quadriga‟s global footprint extends across Europe, the Americas, the Middle East, India and key parts of Africa. Plans are also in place to expand into Australasia and South America. This is being achieved through a combination of Quadriga‟s own operations and a distribution model into selected countries and territories.

The company will continue to leverage its capabilities, its partnerships and deep knowledge of the hospitality sector to create solutions that harness the latest technologies and meet ever evolving customer needs and guest expectations. See www.quadriga.com