Hotel Equities Appoints Brian Jenkins to Lead HE Labs, the Management Company’s New Innovation Division

ATLANTA, Ga. - Hotel Equities (HE), a best-in-class hospitality operator, announces the appointment of Brian Jenkins as Head of HE Labs™, Hotel Equities' dedicated innovation and incubation platform built for evaluating emerging technologies, developing AI-driven workflows, and advancing new operating models designed to improve owner returns and hotel performance across the portfolio. In this role, Jenkins will oversee all HE Labs initiatives, from testing and evaluation to deployment, ensuring each advances through a defined progression before being implemented at the property-level and scaled.

"Brian's background sits at the intersection of strategy and hospitality operations, and that combination is precisely what this role demands," said Ben Rafter, Chief Executive Officer of Hotel Equities. "The industry has never had a shortage of technologies; what it has lacked is the discipline to evaluate them rigorously, integrate them seamlessly, and deploy only those that move the needle. HE Labs exists to deliver validated solutions to owners, not experiments, and Brian brings the discipline, operating perspective, and analytical rigor required to lead that work."

"The gap between what technology promises and what it actually delivers for owners is where HE Labs operates," said Jenkins. "This is the right moment for this kind of platform. Our focus is to bring discipline to that gap: evaluating what works, deploying what fits, and scaling solutions that improve performance."

Before leading HE Labs, Jenkins served as Executive Vice President of Strategic Initiatives, shaping Hotel Equities' broader technology and innovation strategy, conducting business development, and applying quantitative analysis to operational decision-making, including the development of the Hospitality Intelligence (H.I.) platform, Springboard's proprietary system blending technology and human insight to enhance operational efficiency. Previously, Jenkins held a series of strategic roles at Springboard Hospitality, which he joined in 2016 ahead of its combination with Hotel Equities in 2025.

Before entering hospitality, Jenkins was a strategy consultant at Capco in New York, where he advised leading financial institutions on IT strategy, organizational restructuring, change management, and risk management. He holds a B.A. in Financial Economics from Columbia University.

For more information about Hotel Equities and its leadership, visit https://www.hotelequities.com/meet-our-team.htm. To learn more about HE Labs™, visit https://www.hotelequities.com/he-labs.htm.