West

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 63rd running of the list.

Fortune 500

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 62nd running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 61st running of the list. Wal-Mart claims the top spot again. See who made the list.

Wal-Mart stayed on top as its sales crept closer to half-a-trillion dollars. Apple moved into the top five. And UnitedHealth Group continued its steady climb. 

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West (WSTC): Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings

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West | Fortune

West (WSTC): Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings | Fortune

In today’s episode of Fortune Daily, we dive into the evolving relationship between business and the next generation. Ziad Ahmed, SVP, UTA Advisory, joins us to break down what companies get right—and critically wrong—about Gen Z, and how those dynamics can change.
Next, Senior AI Reporter Emily Forlini shares her latest reporting on the leadership shakeup at OpenAI. We discuss Brad Lightcap’s departure and the wave of employee exits following recent share sales.
Finally, Editor Nick Lichtenberg joins the show to break down Kalshi’s newest partnership and what it means for the future of prediction markets.


Additional images courtesy of Getty Images




Has Business Got the Creator Economy All Wrong?

Features

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AI is pushing the pace of business beyond what most organizations are used to and beyond what many feel ready for. Decisions are happening faster, expectations are rising, and the margin for error hasn’t changed. Leaders aren’t just asking how to move quickly; they’re asking how to move in ways that don’t create problems later. We’ll bring technology leaders together to share how they’re managing that tension and what they’re accelerating, what they’re scrapping, and how they’re staying focused as everything speeds up.

Sean Bruich, Senior Vice President, AI and Data, Amgen 
Dan Gill, Chief Product Officer, Carvana 
Bret Greenstein, Chief AI Officer, West Monroe 
Nizar Trigui, Chief Technology Officer, GXO 

Hosted by West Monroe

Timing, Trade-Offs, and Speed

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Today's travelers and consumers expect more and have more options than ever before. The companies winning their loyalty aren’t just keeping pace—they're making big operational bets and executing under pressure. The operational leaders of Southwest Airlines and MGM Resorts have both been inside major transformations: reinventing legacy systems and reimagining the guest experience end-to-end. They'll share what it takes to stay ahead of shifting consumer expectations and bring an entire organization along for the ride. 

Ayesha Molino, Chief Operating Officer, MGM Resorts International
Tony Roach, Executive Vice President and Chief Customer and Brand Officer, Southwest
Moderator: Ruth Umoh, C-Suite and Leadership Editor, Fortune; Co-Chair, Fortune COO Summit

The Bold Bets that are Reshaping Customer Experience Today

How they've been saving the best for last. Aisha and Tony, thank you so much for joining us here. We're happy to be here. All right, Aisha, let's start with the news, the big news that broke yesterday. Uh, Barry Diller's takeover bid for MGM at an $18 billion valuation, as you already know, he's essentially saying the market is undervaluing the company and there's more growth to unlock. So from your seat as COO, do you agree? Do you think the market has been underestimated in MGM? So. We did receive a takeover offer yesterday and our board of directors is now going to begin its work of doing its fiduciary responsibility in terms of maximizing shareholder value. And you know, from my perspective, the trick is really to make sure that we keep our 60,000 employees focused on what they need to do every single day, which is deliver the best guest service possible. And at our scale that is, you know, it is a big task to keep that kind of population focused, but I think our leaders are well positioned to do it and everyone is very zoned in on the task at hand. I'm gonna push. Do you agree with the sentiment? I'm not gonna comment on that. Fair enough. Uh, well, let me add this question, you know, because in his April letter to shareholders. Dillard did talk about MGM's combination of real world assets and digital growth opportunities. So as you think about reshaping the customer experience, which of these opportunities excite you the most right now? Oh, you know, uh, we are at MGM Resorts. We're in the business of delivering fun. It is fantastic, and that is something that we truly get to do every single day. And from my perspective as COO, that's where the magic lies, right? And so one of the things that I've been really focused on, especially in a business like ours which is all about delivering experience, is how do I get my leaders laser focused on that proposition, get them back on the floor, get them engaged with the customers, get them anticipating customer needs, and then ultimately differentiate, delivering a differentiated customer experience. We're going to dig into and. What that looks like in practice. Let me turn over to you, Tony, uh, at Southwest, which is also going through its own organizational shifts, certainly another period of transformation. The company announced recently you're now going to oversee not just brand and customer experience but also people leadership and development, fairly unusual combination you don't see all too often. What's the thinking behind putting the employee experience and the customer experience under one sole leader? Yeah it's it's, it's, it is complex in terms of how it is designed from an organization stand standpoint but the actual principle is simple we're trying to elevate the employee experience and their journey so that they can deliver the type of customer experience that our brand and our business essentially is counting on. And so as we've been making transformation, especially on the customer facing side we wanna elevate the transformation for our employees which is, you know, we have 80,000 employees who are the lead actors in everything that we're doing and so this new role just brings these together and essentially joins these two efforts in tandem, uh, so that we don't miss a beat. Southwest is in this period of reinvention. About two years ago, the company pivoted, uh, did away with assigned seating, or it announced it was gonna do it with assigned seat in July 2024. Um, also got rid of course corrected, uh, on its two free checked bags policy which was long known for. For, uh, and was really one of the most recognizable parts of the brand you're now in the process of doing the work actually on the ground doing the work. So what have you learned about leading and bringing customers along through a transformation, especially one where some customers were a little iffy about the changes that were coming to a company that they've known for for decades. Yeah sure if you guys haven't known we've been going through a few changes at Southwest. I don't know if everybody in the room has seen those, um, but it's been the talk of the industry and at the root of it you have to understand what led to the changes you know we are a brand that's been iconic, um. Uh, but we wanna be sustainable and so fundamentally we needed to change our business model so that we have the future to look forward to and so when you anchor into that you then go and pick and choose where you wanna change and our, our, our position on this is you have to change the ecosystem around. Uh, the heart, but you don't change the heart, meaning the heart being the people and the service that we provide. So we went from open seating to assigned seating in, in, in any industry that's like changing the engine in a car from an airline standpoint, um, because it's a revenue change in terms of what you sell, but it's also an operational change. I mean how you turn airplanes and how you seat them matters and so we did both of those at the same time. And I would say when you look at what's going well, both the revenue has, has been exceeding our expectations operation actually is running better than it was before and now you have customer and people sentiment that typically trails those. And so what you see is doing now is really turning our attention to post-transformation. It's about the transformation of the brand and the culture, um, and I think when you look ahead that remaining piece I think really puts us in a position for the next 50 years to be. Uh, just as beloved as we were in the 1st 50, let me follow up with you before I turn to you, Ayesha. There's what I call this like corporate dead zone where a company is no longer cheap enough to be a budget retailer, but they're not seen as elite enough yet to compete with the legacy first class experiences. So how are you defining Southwest's unique version of premium, uh, so you don't get trapped in this forgotten middle. Yeah, and travel is occasion based, especially the airline, and so there's enough occasions to meet, uh, different needs. And so when you think about the Southwest product, it's always been middle basically middle class to lower class in terms of what we've been adding and all we're doing is widening in the aperture to be able to add more premium into the mix doesn't mean we're trying to be Delta because we don't think we need to be Delta to be successful, but when you look at how people travel. Travel, you may have a different product that you prefer by the occasion, and we think that we can add some more premium into the mix that will serve those needs and be accretive to a kind of the base business that we've been, uh, that we've created over time. Aha, you have a similar balance and act that you're navigating. I mean, MGM owns a massive portfolio of hotels on the Vegas Strip, and especially as consumers are more cost conscious travelers, they're scrutinizing the cost of a Vegas. Yet they still expect more luxury, more personalization, more entertainment, more convenience. How are you thinking about delivering value for price sensitive guests without also diluting this premium brand and and alienating some of those luxury customers you have? Yeah, absolutely. Differentiation such as we have in our portfolio creates complexity but also opportunity, and we had to really redefine what value means in the context of our portfolio. And that redefinition is what? So at a property like Bellagio, um, it really means, again, an ultra luxury customer experience that is personalized and unparalleled for Luxor and Excalibur, which were, which are two of our more value. Oriented resorts. We actually launched an all-inclusive earlier this year. It's a package we're very proud of, and it includes room, resort fee, parking, 3 meals a day for 2 people, including alcoholic beverage, show tickets, roller coaster rides, so really the entirety of the Vegas experience at one fixed price. And we understood, we heard loud and clear last year from our customers that they felt like they weren't getting that value proposition from Vegas anymore, particularly at our core properties. So we, we listened, we heard it, and we changed. Following up with you, you know, guests don't think in terms of hotels and restaurants and rewards apps and loyalty programs. They think about whether this trip felt effortless. Um, so how do you design an experience that feels seamless across so many different touch points from beginning to end? Just think about the full customer journey. Yeah, it's a real challenge, you know, the customer journey, of course, begins when the customer starts actually searching for their destination, searching for their trip, right? And so it's from that point on that we really think. About how we make the customer journey as smooth and frictionless as possible. So that's everything from looking at our marketing to redesigning and reevaluating our booking flows, to once the customer lands at the airport, we work very closely, Tony and I were just talking about this, with our airport authority to make sure that facilitation of passenger traffic through our airports and on our roads is smooth and seamless. Every part of it has to be considered when they enter the property, and the all-inclusive was A great example of this, you know, we are a massive company that is not designed to be an all inclusive. We had to reverse engineer that and at the back end stitch every piece of that together to really create a product that to the customer felt like that, felt seamless and was technologically enabled, but we really went through every piece of it as a customer would to make sure that we could deliver on that promise. Of course deployment of standard technology like mobile check-in, kiosk, check-in, check out. Um, but also enhancing the in-room experience in terms of making sure that In-im requests that go to our housekeeping team, for example, are delivered faster and that service can be delivered smoother and quicker as well. So you just have to look at every part of it but walk, walk it as a consumer would. So it definitely has become more complex. Yeah. Similar question for you, Tony. Southwest has also said the customer journey extends far beyond the flight itself. So as you also look at that entire journey, where are you most focused right now and what tells you where you need to invest in the future? It customers clearly tell you where you need to invest because you're looking at where behavior is changing. You can also look at what makes or makes the trip in terms of retention and growth and so we, we follow that very closely, um, and for us it's similar to ISIS. I mean you customers travel and there's a lot of time in between travel where they're considering traveling again and so for us the journey is that entire ecosystem. Um, so the way that we prioritize though how to make sure we're getting the seams correctly is really where the commercial side of the business has to partner with the operational side because that's usually where the seams are broken. It's something we are selling that the operation has to deliver and we created a team that that that is their sole job is to create a joint commercial and ops team. And they pick those experiences that often get broken on that handoff, and their job is to try to fix it and remove friction out of that. You were telling me earlier that Southwest is in this era where it's going back to its roots and it has to make its brand very clear. What is the new Southwest? Similar question, what is the new MGM? Well, the new Southwest is the old Southwest. Um, back to your roots, when you look at, people used to, people fell in love with Southwest because we, it was fun. It was fun to fly. The service was great. Before we gave away two free bags. People loved Southwest for the flight attendants and, you know, we had a sense of humor and our, our ads were. etc. and we think that there's a lot of history that actually is the bones of where we have to be back again. So in this, in many cases the the revitalization of what actually created the love we have a heart at the bottom on the bottom of our airplane is that's very rare and so we think that is actually the secret to the future and so you'll see a revitalization of that. So some of the or changes you talked about at the beginning is if we're gonna market that we gotta deliver that. My job is to try to marry those two things together. And very similar for MGM, you know, I think, especially what we're seeing from our customers today is that what they value is a place where they can come and feel special. At our scale, that can be hard to deliver, but our focus is really, really on that. I mean, I said this earlier, but we have spent an extreme, extremely significant amount of time thinking about how we get our leadership teams, refocused on our customers and our employees and not sitting in their offices on teams calls, right? How do we free up the time and how do we create the intention to engage and make sure that when we talk about what our customer wants, we're actually going out there and talking to our customer. Millions of them walk through our doors every single day, and we have this incredible opportunity to get that immediate feedback and that's really so much of where our focus today is, which is much how the industry operated 30 years ago. Much of that customer's feedback, as you already alluded to, is certainly in person meeting with the customer. I meet with those who are coming to your various properties, but both of your organizations also sit on a treasure trove of customer data and feedback. How do you go about turning that information into action, into meaningful improvements? Give some examples. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, like most companies in our industry, we obviously use NPS as a really meaningful indicator of how we're doing, and it provides a lot of empirical data on really key issues about the customer experience and we utilize all. That to engage both in terms of big picture sort of policy and procedural shifts, but also direct engagement with the customer. And so that's a really, really meaningful data pool. Ultimately that will tell one part of the story, but it really is our customers who directly give us the narrative, right? And you need to, in my experience, we need to marry the both of those in order to really compellingly understand how we need to change, especially when we're talking about major shifts in the operating business. very similar, it, you know, NPS data is certainly there. AI allows you to listen to all channels now. I try not to listen to Reddit because it's just inherently negative. We can see everything, and the thing is you see it very quickly. What do you do about it is actually how you prioritize what actually is mattering the most. Our employees adding them into that mix typically leads to the actual solution when we launch. Assigned seating on day one we knew we were not boarding the airplane correctly. People did not like the boarding groups. They hated them. And so we almost the first 2nd day we started working on changes. We're on iteration number 7 now until we get it perfect and that's just a matter of you take feedback, you use the right people and the experts to solve solutions, and you need a mentality in the organization that that's OK. Any questions from the audience? If you have a question, raise your hand. We'll bring a mic over to you. Any questions please remain a few minutes. Let's end with this. Um, if you could leave this audience of fellow operating chiefs with one principle for leading customer centered transformation at scale, what would it be? Perhaps Tony, we start with you. Say, would you repeat the question please? Uh, if you could leave this audience of CEOOs with one principle for leading customer centered transformation at scale, what would that be? Yeah, I think, I mean, for our business and, and very similar probably to yours is the outcome of the experience we want is only what we enable our people to do, and, uh, we can design as much as we want on paper, um, but it's a matter of equipment and empowering our people to be able to do it with clear expectations, the right infrastructure, so they're incentivized to continue to do it. Uh, and then the motivation to give them something to believe in. Please closing salvo. Yeah, absolutely. You know, for us, what we've realized that with our scale and our number of frontline employees, we have to keep it very, very simple, and the core foundation of our operating business is that our employees have to be empowered to say yes. They, at our scale, things go wrong, they go wrong every single day. We know that. We can't always prevent that, but we can 100% influence how we recover from it. And to make sure that that is really the operating foundation that's distilled. Throughout the organization, whether you've been there 30 years or a day is really the core of what we focus on. Yeah, well, both of you are certainly correct in that everyone's always thinking about their next trip. I certainly am itching for my next trip. Uh, Tony, Ayesha, thank you for a thoughtful discussion on leading transformation while still keeping customers at the center. Very much appreciated.

From a single Los Angeles motel to a multi-billion-dollar global chain, Hyatt is redefining the meaning of luxury. After leading the company for almost two decades, CEO Mark Hoplamazian gives us an inside look at the hotel operator’s newest frontier: a full-scale brand reorganization designed for the next generation. By shifting from real estate ownership to high-margin luxury experiences, Hyatt is doubling down on the future of luxury travel. In this episode of Behind the Business, Fortune’s Matt Heimer explores how Hoplamazian and Hyatt are navigating transformation in a shifting travel landscape.

Hyatt Hotel’s extensive portfolio features over 1,450 hotels and resorts spread across over 80 countries, ranging from more affordable standard hotel rooms to luxury all-inclusive resorts. Now, in order to meet shifting travel trends and remain competitive among rivals many times its size, Hyatt is nearing the final stages of a full-scale brand reorganization. Here’s why Hyatt is selling real-estate and investing in luxury, experiences, and tech-backed trip planning to book the next generation of travelers.

Why Hyatt is Leaning into Luxury | Behind the Business

How do you actually deliver what the brand promises that actually requires two things. First, super clarity about what the brand stands for and why it is positioned that way to be responsive to what the guest base needs. From its modest motel beginnings, Hyatt has constructed one of the largest hotel and resort portfolios in the world. The company remains far smaller than industry leaders Hilton and Mer. It and rising operational expenses, travel uncertainty, and external shocks like the COVID-19 pandemic have made growth difficult. Hyatt's strategy sell real estate and invest in expanding its luxury brands. Instead of splitting your attention between being a great property owner, we are now really focused on brand building and investing in the brands backed by data-driven. Loyalty programs and new brand acquisitions. H Hyatt is positioning itself to expand its lead in luxury and experiential travel. Younger consumers are spending on these really specialized experiences. It's not a one size fits all anymore. Here's why Hyatt is building brands instead of hotels in order to keep the next generation of travelers checked in. In 1957, a Chicago lawyer named Jay Pritzker purchased and opened the Hyatt House, a motel near LAX. Hyatt has steadily expanded since then into one of the largest companies in the hospitality industry, built in part by veteran CEO Mark Holomasian. This is our founder. Yes, right, Jay Prisker. Yeah. Since stepping into the role in 2006, Hoelmazian has led Hyatt through an IPO, managed the company through the turbulent. COVID-19 pandemic and more than tripled the total number of branded properties in Hyatt's worldwide portfolio. Today, Halomasian is steering Hyatt through the later stages of a massive brand reorganization centered around an asset light strategy. This means selling real estate and transitioning to fee-based revenue streams. These might include earnings from managing and operating hotels or licensing properties to franchisees. In 2025, 80% of Hyatt's profits came from this kind of fee-based revenue, up from just 57% in 2019. And by the end of the year, the company had reached its goal of raising $2 billion in physical asset sales. Hyatt aims to have over 90% of its earnings be asset light by 2027. During your time as CEO, you led Hyatt through what's called an asset light transformation. Why did Choose to do that and what has been the impact of it. It really focuses one's attention. Instead of splitting your attention between being a great property owner and asset manager and a brand builder, we are now really focused on brand building and investing in the brands and the technology platform behind that. So you're really now you're much more focused on talent and marketing and public messaging without necessarily having to worry as much about plumbing, parking, maintenance. You're right. Halimasian and Hyatt's brand strategy organizes the company into 5 distinct brand groups luxury, lifestyle, inclusive, classics, and essentials. Luxury includes some of Hyatt's most upscale brands like the Park Hyatt, while essentials brands like H Hyatt Studios offer a more straightforward business hotel type experience. Marriott and Hilton, both of whose property and financial portfolios are considerably bigger than Hyatt's are also going asset light. In fact, both started their transitions to an asset light model before Hyatt. In order to differentiate itself, Hyatt is leaning into one of the fastest growing sectors in the industry, luxury travel. I think in your Q3 report, the company mentioned that it seemed like from the consumer side, the luxury and lifestyle segment was the one where the demand seemed strongest, where economic threats seemed least. Is that still the case? Do you still feel like luxury is where the growth is going to come from? Absolutely, we have the biggest representation proportionately speaking in our portfolio of luxury and lifestyle versus our competitors, so we've been advantaged during this period of time when luxury has been the strongest segment. I think 26, no matter what happens, the so-called K-shaped economy is going to persist. That doesn't make me happy, by the way. We have to recognize that that's what's happening. And so I do think that luxury will be the highest performer. And this is a very big change in psychology. Hyatt is already a leader in luxury travel. More than 70% of Hyatt's rooms are luxury or upper upscale compared to Marriott at 51% and Hilton at 28%. Since announcing its asset light strategy in 2017, Hyatt has acquired around 10 luxury and upscale hotel lines, including Mr. and Mrs. Smith and Dream Hotel Group, to add to its brand groups. It's a vibe, right? Right? Exactly. It is a vibe and it's a stunning vibe. Yes, it is happening today too, isn't it? Laurie? You're the first global executive I've ever interviewed in front of a basketball hoop. Where are we? What is this place? Yeah, isn't it great? We are in the Chicago Athletic Association. It started as a men's club in the 1890s, has been reimagined as a hotel, and came into the H Hyatt portfolio in 2019. I've got the beautiful Gothic architecture and the crazy carvings. I do not see a Hyatt logo anywhere. Is that intentional? And if it is, how come? Yeah, for this hotel, the Chicago Athletic Association, it is part of the Unbound collection. And what is special about the Unbound collection is every property is unique and historic and tells its own story. May I see the ballroomhould we go check it out? Can we see the ballroom? Let's go to the ballroom. Younger consumers are spending on experiences. This is. The White City Ballroom we're working on curating different types of collections of properties that will tailor to more romantic travel or outdoor luxury travel. It's not a one size fits all anymore. It's these really specialized experiences. I know that the past several years on the branding topic that there have been some really key acquisitions for H Hyatt, especially in the luxury space. Bringing in other brands into the portfolio where from a customer's perspective we're not necessarily going to know about the Hyatt affiliation. How does that sort of change the challenge of maintaining the focus of the company? We have over 62 million loyalty members and the program has been extremely healthy. It's been growing at a 20% compounded growth rate in the last several years straight. When we designed World of Hyatt, it was designed as an experience platform, not as a points program. A lot of loyalty programs are basically The transactional in nature and we wanted it to be something that was actually meaningful to our members. Yes, it's points. It includes points, but we view points as a means to an end that's not just a room night but an overall experience. When you talk about points being about experiences as well as loyalty, does that mean in practice that the points can also be used for things outside of just the stay? We launched a world of Hyatt find experiences also about. Two years ago now and we have experiences on properties we have experiences that we call limited time experiences. What are some travel trends that you're thinking about that are sort of specific to 2026? New things coming down the pike or things that you're going to see expanding? Experiential travel is not slowing down, whether it's for sporting events. We've got some big ones coming to the US, whether it's music or these more niche things are really. Unique one that we launched was with Reese's Book Club. We brought the authors of the month and we hosted reading retreats as part of an outdoor luxury collection experience. So something that we're seeing with travel is in not just experiences but these sort of niche experiences as the brand portfolio expands with the kind of acquisitions you've been describing, how do you make sure that the experience. The customer and that the company's values are consistent across these platforms, especially when some of these platforms to a consumer may not even be recognizable as a Hyatt. If you understand what people actually need, then you can actually appropriately care for them. So that is at the foundation and the core of every single touch point that you would experience across the Hyatt offerings across every brand, across every country, and across all the other experiences. In order to better recognize and deliver these experiences, Hyatt is investing in AI and in-depth data analytics and building personalized intent-based search tools configured around users' individual travel preferences. How do you keep a sense of brand and company identity consistent across experiences in a world where AI is playing a bigger role perhaps in connecting your customers to you? We characterize AI as an augmentation of how you can get closer to your customers, removing a bunch of the administrative tasks that our frontline colleagues are actually burdened with currently. It gives them more time to just be human, human to human interaction. There is so much new technology that helps us to deliver really personalized and tailored content, and now we can speak to you as an individual differently than the next member. The other thing it allows you to do is capture information on that individual that you would never otherwise be able to get true fidelity of information about Matt and his family so that we can better care for you in the future. You became CEO in 2006, and that means that this bare wall that we're walking towards is going to be the wall that gets the next chapter. What are the things that you most want to see on that wall? We've changed the profile of the company and now the launch point from this point forward is how we actually corralling and using the best of technology to continuously make our colleagues' lives easier, make our guests' lives better, and how we can care for more people.

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