• Home
  • Latest
  • Fortune 500
  • Finance
  • Tech
  • Leadership
  • Lifestyle
  • Rankings
  • Multimedia

Trendingnow

1

As Big Tech showers employees with perks to win the talent war, Nvidia built a nearly $5 trillion company by making people pay for their own lunch

2

MacKenzie Scott alone accounted for one-third of America's $19.2 billion in megagifts last year

3

Today, Emily Blunt is worth $80 million thanks to her Hollywood career—but she actually wanted to be a UN Spanish translator on $80K

1

As Big Tech showers employees with perks to win the talent war, Nvidia built a nearly $5 trillion company by making people pay for their own lunch

2

MacKenzie Scott alone accounted for one-third of America's $19.2 billion in megagifts last year

3

Today, Emily Blunt is worth $80 million thanks to her Hollywood career—but she actually wanted to be a UN Spanish translator on $80K
TechPriceline

Priceline Founder Launches New Company Aimed at Business Travelers

By
Kirsten Korosec
Kirsten Korosec
Down Arrow Button Icon
By
Kirsten Korosec
Kirsten Korosec
Down Arrow Button Icon
June 21, 2016, 7:32 AM ET
Francis Catania
Add Fortune on Google for similar content.

Priceline.com founder and entrepreneur Jay Walker launched a new company Tuesday that uses big data analytics, cloud computing, and a mobile app to turn flexibility into dollars for business travelers.

The premise of Upside is simple enough: Reward business travelers with gift cards for being a little more flexible with their flight and hotel.

Pulling this off is a bit more complicated.

“When Priceline was created, we knew that flexibility would become an extraordinary asset in the modern commercial world,” Walker told Fortune in an interview. “We also knew that to really make it work you needed enormous software power and you needed all kinds of tools that didn’t yet exist.

“It’s one of those problems that rattle around in the back of your head, like an unfinished song. I’ve got the music, I’ve got this melody, but I’ve got to get the harmony just right.”

Now Walker can make that harmony, thanks to the falling cost of cloud computing, mobile apps, and big data, which allows enormous volumes of information to be analyzed. Walker even credits ride-hailing services like Uber and Lyft for changing the nature of business travel, specifically the willingness of people to stay in hotels a little farther away from their business.

“It was really only in the last year to 18 months that it was clear that all the pieces came together and we could actually finish what we couldn’t before,” says Walker, who will lead Upside along with several other Priceline (PCLN) alumni, including former CTO Scott Case and Tim Brier, the former president of Priceline Europe.

How Amazon took over the cloud:

Upside is working with several database content owners such as Expedia and Sabre, which act as clearinghouses for fares and schedules for airlines, to access the massive inventory of flights and hotel rooms. Upside then reconstructs the database with a new layer of analytics that focuses on flexibility. Upside pulls this all together and packages it in a mobile app that is designed to quickly show business travelers what their flexibility is worth by answering a few simple questions.

For instance, a business traveler might earn a gift card for staying at a hotel that’s farther away from a convention center or taking a flight that leaves 30 minutes earlier. When a business traveler uses the Upside mobile app to buy a flight and hotel package he or she can expect to get $100 to $200 in free gift cards, and international travelers will typically get twice as much, Walker says. Costs will be reduced between 5% and 15% for the business traveler’s company as well, according to Upside.

Users can also apply the value of the gift card to reduce the cost of their flight or hotel, a feature Walker says will be particularly appealing for individuals who own small businesses.

A $35 service fee is applied every time the business traveler books a package through the app. The service fee provides users with 24-hour customer service. Users can only book travel originating in the United States.

Get Data Sheet, Fortune’s technology newsletter.

The company will open up a beta version mobile app in mid-September to business travelers who sign up as VIPs, starting today. All VIPs will receive a guaranteed $150 minimum in free gift cards for every Upside package purchased this year.

Upside will initially launch with 30 to 50 different gift cards. These will not be the physical gift cards found at the grocery checkout line. These are e-gift cards, which are downloaded to the user’s mobile phone a couple of days after he or she buys a travel package on the app. Walker wasn’t ready to name which gift cards will be offered; however, he did say Upside is working with Blackhawk, one of the largest gift card suppliers in the United States.

Walker, who is chairman of research and development firm Walker Digital, believes every business traveler is going to want to see what his or her flexibility is worth.

“Why wouldn’t you want to know if it only take a couple of minutes and it’s sort of fun to see what it’s really worth?” Walker asks.

Upside’s target market is small and medium businesses, not the big, highly managed Fortune 500 companies, Walker says. And while the seasoned “road warrior” will certainly benefit from using Upside, Walker says the core customers will likely be people who travel domestically four to six times a year or twice a year internationally.

The real promise in Upside is the company’s flexibility platform, or engine, which can work in other industries too, including healthcare and consumer products, Walker says.

“It works in anything where there’s an extremely complex, ever-changing data set and where only you know what your elasticity trade-offs are worth to you.”

About the Author
By Kirsten Korosec
See full bioRight Arrow Button Icon
Add Fortune on Google for similar content.

Latest in Tech

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025

Most Popular

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Fortune Secondary Logo
Rankings
  • 100 Best Companies
  • Fortune 500
  • Global 500
  • Fortune 500 Europe
  • Most Powerful Women
  • World's Most Admired Companies
  • See All Rankings
  • Lists Calendar
Sections
  • Finance
  • Fortune Crypto
  • Features
  • Leadership
  • Health
  • Commentary
  • Success
  • Retail
  • Mpw
  • Tech
  • Lifestyle
  • CEO Initiative
  • Asia
  • Politics
  • Conferences
  • Europe
  • Newsletters
  • Personal Finance
  • Environment
  • Magazine
  • Education
Customer Support
  • Frequently Asked Questions
  • Customer Service Portal
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms Of Use
  • Single Issues For Purchase
  • International Print
Commercial Services
  • Advertising
  • Fortune Brand Studio
  • Fortune Analytics
  • Fortune Conferences
  • Business Development
  • Group Subscriptions
About Us
  • About Us
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map
  • About Us
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map
  • Facebook icon
  • Twitter icon
  • LinkedIn icon
  • Instagram icon
  • Pinterest icon

Latest in Tech

Michael Burry just shorted Caterpillar’s 172% AI rally. One analyst says his bet won’t even matter
Investingstock prices
Michael Burry just shorted Caterpillar’s 172% AI rally. One analyst says his bet won’t even matter
By Marco Quiroz-GutierrezJuly 2, 2026
6 hours ago
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent
EconomyDebt
AI’s $2.2 trillion deficit fix is already half fake, economists say
By Tristan BoveJuly 2, 2026
7 hours ago
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei
AIEye on AI
Anthropic’s Fable model is back. But U.S. AI policy is still a mess
By Jeremy KahnJuly 2, 2026
8 hours ago
ai
North AmericaImmigration
Trump’s $46 billion ‘smart wall’ with Mexico bets on AI and scale
By Rebecca Santana and The Associated PressJuly 2, 2026
9 hours ago
sk
AISouth Korea
AI “grief videos” turn mourning into a $390 service in South Korea
By Hyung-Jin Kim and The Associated PressJuly 2, 2026
9 hours ago
Securitize CEO Carlos Domingo looks to the far right during a conference.
CryptoBlockchain
Securitize is latest crypto company to go public as BlackRock-backed firm sees stock jump 3% on debut
By Camila Grigera NaónJuly 2, 2026
9 hours ago

Most Popular

As Big Tech showers employees with perks to win the talent war, Nvidia built a nearly $5 trillion company by making people pay for their own lunch
Big Tech
As Big Tech showers employees with perks to win the talent war, Nvidia built a nearly $5 trillion company by making people pay for their own lunch
By Marco Quiroz-GutierrezJuly 1, 2026
2 days ago
MacKenzie Scott alone accounted for one-third of America's $19.2 billion in megagifts last year
Success
MacKenzie Scott alone accounted for one-third of America's $19.2 billion in megagifts last year
By Sydney LakeJune 25, 2026
8 days ago
Today, Emily Blunt is worth $80 million thanks to her Hollywood career—but she actually wanted to be a UN Spanish translator on $80K
Success
Today, Emily Blunt is worth $80 million thanks to her Hollywood career—but she actually wanted to be a UN Spanish translator on $80K
By Orianna Rosa RoyleJuly 2, 2026
19 hours ago
Mark Zuckerberg feeds his cows macadamia nuts and beer to create the 'highest-quality beef in the world' on his $300 million estate in Hawaii
Success
Mark Zuckerberg feeds his cows macadamia nuts and beer to create the 'highest-quality beef in the world' on his $300 million estate in Hawaii
By Sasha RogelbergJuly 2, 2026
9 hours ago
Current price of oil as of July 1, 2026
Personal Finance
Current price of oil as of July 1, 2026
By Joseph HostetlerJuly 1, 2026
2 days ago
Americans are escaping the U.S. for New Zealand where house prices have hit a new low—but only wealthy Americans with $3 million spare can invest
Success
Americans are escaping the U.S. for New Zealand where house prices have hit a new low—but only wealthy Americans with $3 million spare can invest
By Emma BurleighJuly 2, 2026
11 hours ago

© 2026 Fortune Media IP Limited. All Rights Reserved. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy | CA Notice at Collection and Privacy Notice | Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information
FORTUNE is a trademark of Fortune Media IP Limited, registered in the U.S. and other countries. FORTUNE may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.