SCALE Central & Eastern Europe 2026

Choosing the right tech stack can make or break your short-term rental business – but with hundreds of tools on the market, where do you even start? In this session, we cut through the noise and explore what a smart, scalable tech setup actually looks like for vacation rental operators. Walk away with a clear framework for evaluating, selecting, and building the tools that fit your business – not someone else’s.

The Smart Room Is Not a Feature. It’s the New Floor.

Short-term rental operators have automated bookings, pricing, and communications. The property itself is still waiting.

This session makes the practical case for connected properties: sensors that prevent damage before it costs you, energy that adjusts to real occupancy, guests who control their environment without calling you, and AI assistants that handle local recommendations, upsells, and requests around the clock – at scale, across your entire portfolio.

We’ll look at what the data says about guest expectations, where IoT delivers measurable ROI, and why the next competitive gap won’t be your listing or your price – it will be the experience inside the property.

We close with a direct challenge to everyone in the room: your PMS should be the hub connecting all of it. Is it?

Your properties could be perfectly priced and still invisible. In this session, Miro Gospodinov will use real data from thousands of Booking.com and Airbnb listings to reveal the ranking and visibility factors that actually drive revenue – and show why most operators are only optimising a fraction of what matters.

During this session we will examine the major forces reshaping the short-term rental industry in 2026, focusing closely on the Bulgarian market and its evolving regulatory environment. Sustainable growth now requires technology, structured processes, and a willingness to manage differently than before.

During this session we will explore how property managers can scale their operations through automation and standardized workflows without losing the human touch that defines great hospitality. Drawing on real data and practical examples, the talk challenges the idea that automation means cold service – and shows how the right approach can actually improve guest satisfaction while reducing team burnout.

In the fast-paced world of short-term rentals, chaos is inevitable- back-to-back turns, last-minute changes, and constant pressure to deliver great stays. This session reveals the systems, workflows, and leadership strategies top operators use to stay in control. Learn practical communication tactics, tech-enabled checklists, and accountability tools to help your team move faster, stay aligned, and reduce stress.

In this session, Sab Mulligan shares real examples and live conversations where Zzzing’s AI Guest Experience Champion, Zoe, does the heavy lifting so humans can show up for guests more than ever before. You’ll see how smart, policy-led AI creates space for genuine connection, making hospitality an attractive career path for people who are truly guest-centric.