Choice Hotels International promoted Sireesha Kunduri to chief of product engineering.
In her new role, Kunduri will head up the software product delivery functions within Choice’s technology team in support of its brands, revenue management and membership rewards. Kunduri joined Choice in 2016 as director, engineering, and was promoted to vice president, engineering in 2019.
“Choice operates at the intersection of hospitality, franchising and technology, and Kunduri has been instrumental in driving the technological innovation that fuels our commitment to delivering value to our hotel owners and guests,” Choice Hotels Chief Information Officer Brian Kirkland said in a statement. “With her wealth of experience and proven track record of success, I’m confident Kunduri will help us take the technology products we develop for our franchisees, our customers and across the enterprise to the next level.”
Choice Hotels has made several tech advances in the hospitality industry over the years:
- In 1995, Choice launched the first hotel website with real-time rate and availability information.
- In 2003, Choice launched the industry’s first cloud-based property-management system, ChoiceAdvantage.
- In 2009, Choice released the first consumer-facing hotel app for iOS.
- In 2018, Choice launched the first cloud-based central-reservation system, ChoiceEdge.
- In 2021, Choice launched the first mobile-enabled revenue management system, ChoiceMax.
- In early 2024, Choice became the first hotel company to migrate its entire system infrastructure to the cloud.