AI is giving Trivago and its CEO Johannes Thomas a new playbook on how to beat back disruption

Trivago CEO Johannes Thomas credits AI for the company's 21% second-quarter revenue growth to 168.4 million euros ($196.4 million), and he now spends over half his time on AI transformation. Thomas advises other CEOs to 'invest at least one or two hours into AI and rethinking your work.'

In today’s CEO Daily: Trivago’s CEO says you need to “invest at least one or two hours into AI” The big leadership story: Bessent threatens expanded sanctions on countries that do business with Iran The markets: Mild optimism in global markets heading into the U.S. trading session Plus: All the news and watercooler chat from Fortune . Good morning. Trivago is a platform that should arguably be gone by now. Having suffered a near-death experience during https://fortune.com/2025/06/08/trivago-leadership-ceo-cfo-cmo-former-interns-turn-company-from-deep-winter-back-to-billions-revenue/ the pandemic, this hotel search site would seem ripe for disruption in an age of AI. It’s smaller and narrower than Booking https://fortune.com/company/booking-holdings/ Holdings check out CEO Glenn Fogel’s recent interview https://fortune.com/2026/08/14/glenn-fogel-worlds-largest-online-travel-business-booking-holdings/ with my colleague Kamal Ahmed or majority owner Expedia https://fortune.com/company/expedia-group/ . It performs a search function that Google, Kayak and others seem to do well. And yet the mid-sized Dusseldorf-based site is profitable and grew almost 20% last year to about $633 million in revenue. More recently, it reported second-quarter revenue growth of 21% https://ir.trivago.com/news-releases/news-release-details/trivago-delivers-21-growth-q2-raises-guidance-again-after-sixth , reaching 168.4 million euros $196.4 million . CEO Johannes Thomas credits AI. When Trivago’s supervisory board met late last year, Thomas told me the debate came down to a choice: “Do you go for efficiency and downsize Trivago to 200 people, or do you go from 600 to an impact of 6,000 by leveraging AI?” They chose to aim for the latter and he now spends more than half of his time on AI transformation, up from roughly a quarter of his time a year ago. “Small or medium‑sized companies with a tech DNA are in a very sweet spot,” he told me, arguing that there are fewer layers of bureaucracy or union politics to slow down adoption. The organization is so flat that he’s now building more applications and systems himself. He designed what he calls a “role evolution agent” that scans each employee’s work, messages, job description and other material to give them a personalized playbook on what to automate and how their job is likely to look different in a few years. “I can suddenly realize things I had in my mind but could not build because resources were constrained,” he said. “I probably spend 10 hours more working a week. I have three kids, so I need to sacrifice even more but it’s very exciting.” And what happened when he turned that agent on himself? “It came out: get rid of earnings preparation … and it prepares me for the performance chat because 70% of the work is done,” he said. His advice: “I would tell other CEOs the exact same thing I tell everybody in this company: Invest at least one or two hours into AI and rethinking your work. Just block your calendar and do it.” Contact CEO Daily via Diane Brady at diane.brady@fortune.com Top leadership news Bessent grapples with Iran and bond markets Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said https://fortune.com/2026/08/24/scott-bessent-iran-secondary-sanctions-economic-bond-treasury-debt-buybacks/ the U.S. will expand sanctions against countries and companies that do business with Iran. “Any nation that serves as a financial artery of a withering regime should expect to share in its isolation,” Bessent wrote in the Financial Times. https://www.ft.com/content/cb865200-1a06-40be-86a3-10ee2bb05804 He’s also taking the lead to lower long-term borrowing costs through larger bond buybacks. OpenAI hires enterprise-sales veteran Dali Rajic as chief revenue officer OpenAI named https://fortune.com/2026/08/24/who-is-dali-rajic-openais-new-chief-revenue-officer/ Wiz president Dali Rajic as its new chief revenue officer as the GPT developer builds a more predictable sales operation ahead of its hotly anticipated IPO. Rajic replaces Denise Dresser, who held the role for less than a year. One former colleague told Fortune that Rajic is the right kind of executive OpenAI needs to catch up; another source questioned whether Rajic might “burn out like so many other people do at OpenAI.” FTC pushes retailers to disclose when they use personal data to set prices The Federal Trade Commission is seeking public comment https://fortune.com/2026/08/24/ftc-retailers-personalized-pricing-consumer-surveillance/ on a new rule that will force retailers to disclose whether they use personal data to set prices. “When consumers see a listed price, they expect it to be the same price that everyone else sees,” FTC chairman Andrew Ferguson said. The markets S&P 500 futures are up 0.5% this morning. The last session dropped 0.3%. South Korea’s KOSPI rose 0.7%, Japan’s Nikkei 225 is up 0.5%, and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index is flat. India’s NIFTY 50 is up 0.2%, while the STOXX Europe 600 is up 0.4% in early trading. Bitcoin is hovering just below $80,000. Around the watercooler Target, Starbucks and Nike are writing the 2026 turnaround playbook. Here are the key lessons https://fortune.com/2026/08/24/target-starbucks-nike-fiddelke-niccol-hill-turnarounds/ by Jeffrey Sonnenfeld and Steven Tian ‘It’s hard to know exactly what the objective of DOGE was’: Former IRS boss warns Elon Musk’s cuts to the tax agency will be felt in years to come https://fortune.com/2026/08/24/former-irs-acting-commissioner-doge-cuts-budget-automation/ by Sasha Rogelberg Here’s how much the $40 trillion national debt is costing you — whether you have student loans, a mortgage or Social Security https://fortune.com/2026/08/24/how-much-40-trillion-national-debt-costs-student-mortgage-retiree-social-security/ by Nick Lichtenberg Goldman Sachs says America’s energy sector will need 500,000 more workers by 2030—and humanoid robots may have to step in https://fortune.com/2026/08/24/americas-energy-sector-needs-500000-more-workers-by-2030-thanks-to-ai-unless-more-workers-retrain-humanoid-robots-step-in/ by Emma Burleigh Asia’s founders are going global faster, sometimes even before they’re sure what their business is, says Stripe’s SEA MD https://fortune.com/2026/08/24/asia-founders-going-global-faster-stripe/ by Angelica Ang Today's edition of CEO Daily is curated and edited by Joseph Abrams, Jason Ma, Nicholas Gordon, and Lee Clifford. 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