Imagine this: It’s autumn 2023, and Alexander Udalov, founder of UNA and Polydom Inc., faces a challenge all hospitality managers know all too well—finding, training, and retaining employees who can master a complex digital ecosystem from PMS to CRM. The catch? Each new hire takes weeks, sometimes months, to onboard. And when they leave, all that accumulated digital know-how walks out the door, dragging down guest service quality.
This burning problem cracked open a revolutionary idea: What if the system isn’t just human-friendly but employee-friendly? A digital employee who never gets tired, never forgets, never calls in sick or quits. An employee that takes on the repetitive tasks so human employees can focus on creativity, human connection, and solving those rare, unique challenges.
Enter UNA — the Universal Digital Employee. A concept long "in the air," but only now ready to make its grand entrance.
Why UNA is a Must-Have Right Now
Around the same time UNA was conceived, the AI boom was exploding worldwide. ChatGPT was freshly released, showing how machines could understand language. But Alex wasn’t after just another chatbot. He envisioned a true digital employee who could work across an entire digital landscape—managing tasks, managing bookings, filtering info, interpreting context, and communicating seamlessly.
We’re standing at the threshold of the third labor revolution. The first revolution mechanized muscle power, then the digital revolution turned data into gold. Now AI is stepping in, not to replace people, but to replace routine. Think about it: in 3 to 5 years, every business could have its own digital workforce just as computers and the internet became everyday tools.
For hotels—where UNA shines the brightest—this means:
- Fluent in 30+ languages, working 24/7 without breaks or errors.
- Simultaneously handling hundreds of requests—calls, bookings, messages, and tasks.
- Instantly routing requests to the right department with full understanding.
UNA isn’t here to replace humans. It redefines how humans work—letting them focus on service and creativity while digital employees manage repetition.
The Challenges Behind Creating UNA
This wasn’t about solving “problems” but overcoming growth challenges. The team built more than a response system; they built a brain for a digital employee who:
- Understands the meaning behind requests—even with errors or multiple tasks in one message.
- Knows where and how to hand off info—to departments, executors, systems, or closing questions on its own.
- Learns continuously from real cases, adapting to each hotel’s unique style and business process.
- Keeps track of dozens of simultaneous conversations while preserving each guest’s context.
Some tricky scenarios tackled included:
- What if a booking came through Booking.com but the request was via WhatsApp?
- How to distinguish VIP guests from regulars?
- How not just to say “we have parking,” but to proactively reserve a spot and notify the front desk?
Every challenge made UNA stronger and smarter!
What’s Next for UNA?
Today, UNA is live in hotels across the US, Germany, Czechia, the Caribbean, and Dubai. It replaces call center staff, aids receptionists, and coordinates housekeeping. And we’re just getting started.
The goal? To put a digital employee in every company worldwide.
If the industrial revolution gifted us steam, the digital revolution gave us computing, this third revolution gives us the most valuable resource of all: time.
That’s how and why UNA was born.