According to a Google search the speed at which new technology becomes established is now two to five years, down from what used to be 50-year cycles.

This insight came from an AI Overview at the top of the SERP page, which I trusted as a shortcut to a fact I was seeking for this welcome.

But is it accurate? In some ways that’s not important, the point is that the existence of this information illustrates how rapidly AI has become embedded in our everyday lives.

It is already shaping how we use the internet to find out what we need to know and airlines will not be immune to the change in customer behaviour it will certainly prompt.

That’s why it is vital that airlines have the technologies in place to react to a future that’s arriving at what feels like a bewildering speed.

In this special supplement we report on the optimism and also the caution related to rise of AI and the new world of agentic commerce it will facilitate.

And we showcase solutions, like Burbank’s pioneering Card Present over Internet (CPoI) protocol, that will ensure airlines aren’t overtaken by events they can’t control.