TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY, DESTINATION AND TOURISM
Sabre Corporation And BCD Travel | November 01, 2022
Sabre Corporation (NASDAQ: SABR) and BCD Travel announced a long-term, multi-faceted strategic partnership that is expected to drive meaningful growth and advancement for both companies and across the travel ecosystem.
Under the newly expanded and long-term technology agreement, BCD Travel expects to increase its booking levels with Sabre. Additionally, the two companies will jointly invest and collaborate on new and advanced solutions that will help accelerate the technology-driven evolution underway across the corporate travel ecosystem.
BCD Travel is a long-time, valued Sabre partner. Over the years, we've tackled industry challenges, innovated and grown together. Today, we take another important step in our partnership as we mutually commit to advancing the future of the travel," said Kurt Ekert, president of Sabre. "This agreement demonstrates our continuing commitment to helping BCD achieve its objectives to differentiate its offerings, improve operational efficiency and grow. Whether that takes the form of providing solutions, or enabling solutions, we will continue to build and sustain the value-added relationship we've enjoyed with BCD for so many years.
The partnership will see the two industry leaders focus on creative solutions for managing growing complexities and evolving customer expectations as well as transforming the impacts of technology and marketplace dynamics into opportunities. Sabre will continue to utilize its technical expertise, innovative energies and corporate stability to help enable BCD's success globally.
"This agreement is in line with our strategy to improve our agility, flexibility and responsiveness in a shifting environment, By extending our long-standing partnership with Sabre, we'll streamline our distribution technology footprint and simplify our operational, technical and future development infrastructure, allowing us to move more rapidly on our clients' behalf as we innovate, anticipate and adjust to emerging market opportunities. As we focus on post-Covid travel complexities and engage on deeper technology collaboration and joint development areas, we will enhance our speed to market with functionalities to improve travelers' planning and booking experience including bringing NDC to life."
-BCD Travel CEO and President John Snyder.
As BCD and Sabre extend and deepen their existing relationship, both companies are expected to benefit as Sabre pursues its ambitious goals of:
Accomplishing its tech transformation with cloud migration, microservice enabled architecture, and use of the latest smart technologies and digital innovations like AI and ML for a future-ready environment both Sabre and BCD can utilize.
Continuing to champion balanced supplier distribution economics on behalf of travel industry constituents for the content access our customers need.
Delivering premium retailing, distribution and fulfillment capabilities, including NDC-enabled solutions, across the value chain.
About Sabre Corporation
Sabre Corporation is a leading software and technology company that powers the global travel industry, serving a wide range of travel companies including airlines, hoteliers, travel agencies and other suppliers. The company provides retailing, distribution and fulfilment solutions that help its customers operate more efficiently, drive revenue and offer personalized traveler experiences. Through its leading travel marketplace, Sabre connects travel suppliers with buyers from around the globe. Sabre's technology platform manages more than $260B worth of global travel spend annually. Headquartered in Southlake, Texas, USA, Sabre serves customers in more than 160 countries around the world. For more information visit www.sabre.com.
About BCD Travel
BCD Travel helps companies make the most of what they spend on travel. We give travelers innovative tools that keep them safe and productive and help them make good choices on the road. We partner with travel and procurement leaders to simplify the complexities of business travel, drive savings and satisfaction, and move whole companies toward their goals. In short, we help our clients travel smart and achieve more. We make this happen in 106 countries with a global client retention rate of 97%, the highest in the industry. For more information, visit www.bcdtravel.com.
About BCD Group
BCD Group is a market leader in the travel industry. The privately owned company was founded in 1975 by John Fentener van Vlissingen and consists of BCD Travel (global corporate travel management and its subsidiary BCD Meetings & Events, global meetings and events agency) and Park 'N Fly (off-airport parking). For more information, visit www.bcdgroup.com.
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TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY,INDUSTRY OUTLOOK
Fareportal | November 18, 2022
Fareportal’s prominence in the travel industry’s adoption of new distribution capability (NDC) to advance travel retailing is growing with its most recent integration of NDC with Amadeus, a leader in global travel technology and long-time partner of Fareportal.
The company behind leading online travel agencies CheapOair and OneTravel, Fareportal has been a front-runner in NDC integrations, with multiple airlines supported over the past few years. Amadeus has been a major driver of NDC since the technology standard’s inception and has heavily invested in retailing capabilities to enable this transition for our industry. Amadeus is live with NDC-enabled content in every region of the world and deeply committed to progressing NDC adoption and collaborating to unlock opportunities for value creation.
Fareportal is leveraging the benefits of the Amadeus Travel Platform to access NDC-enabled content. Among the advantages is the ability for travel sellers to search, compare, book, and service air content through one single platform. Amadeus currently is partnering with more than 20 airlines to distribute NDC-sourced content in the Amadeus Travel Platform. More than half of them are already making their NDC content available in Amadeus.
For the air traveler, the benefit of NDC comes in the form of enhanced retail offerings via a single platform. Passengers can access the full suite of products offered by an airline, all within the OTA’s digital ecosystem. Amadeus’ NDC-enabled solutions allow for complex servicing capabilities for NDC offers, which help streamline customer support, providing the ability to help those travelers who require post transaction service.
“Our partnership with Amadeus has continued to grow and expand over the years. This latest integration highlights the strength of its solutions and the benefit Amadeus provides to our brands, CheapOair and OneTravel.”
-Werner Kunz-Cho, Fareportal CEO
Sam Abdou, Executive Vice President, Airline Distribution, Search and Online, Amadeus, adds, “The fact that our long-term relationship with Fareportal continues to grow is a testament to the strength of our teams and their dedication to technology innovation. We believe that NDC is critical to the advancement of travel retailing and we are dedicated to driving its growth and success for the benefit of all players. Today’s announcement with Fareportal is significant given the role online travel agencies play in advancing NDC and accelerating its adoption around the world.
About Fareportal:
Fareportal is a travel technology company powering a next generation travel concierge service. Utilizing its innovative technology and company-owned and operated global contact centers, Fareportal has built strong industry partnerships providing customers access to over 500 airlines, a million lodgings, and hundreds of car rental companies around the globe. With a portfolio of consumer travel brands including CheapOair and One Travel, Fareportal enables consumers to book online, on mobile apps for iOS and Android, by phone, or live chat. Fareportal provides its airline partners with access to a broad customer base that books high-yielding international and domestic flight, hotel, and other travel and add-on ancillaries.
About Amadeus:
Travel powers progress. Amadeus powers travel. Amadeus’ solutions connect travelers to the journeys they want through travel agents, search engines, tour operators, airlines, airports, hotels, cars and railways. We have developed our technology in partnership with the travel industry for over 30 years. We combine a deep understanding of how people travel with the ability to design and deliver the most complex, trusted, critical systems our customers need. In 2019, we helped connect over 1.9 billion people to local travel providers in over 190 countries. We have a global mindset and a local presence wherever our customers need us. Our purpose is to shape the future of travel. We are passionate in our pursuit of better technology that makes better journeys. Amadeus is an IBEX 35 company, listed on the Spanish Stock Exchange under AMS.MC. The company has also been recognized by the Dow Jones Sustainability Index for the last ten years.To find out more about Amadeus, visit www.amadeus.com.
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TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY, AIRLINES AND AIRPORTS
IBS Software | October 07, 2022
IBS Software, a leading SaaS solutions provider to the travel industry globally, announced that it has been selected by the International Air Transport Association (IATA), as a technology partner for IATA's new CASSLink project, designed to simplify payments in the air cargo industry. The modernized CASSLink has been successfully deployed in the United States air cargo market, in collaboration with IATA's wholly owned subsidiary Cargo Network Services (CNS).CASSLink is IATA's internet-based data processing and customer management system, which puts customers first by meeting the evolving billing and payment requirements for the entire air cargo value chain. It facilitates the interaction and exchange of information between airlines and freight forwarders participating in IATA's Cargo Accounts Settlement System (CASS), simplifying the customer experience and driving operational efficiencies.
Working closely with IATA, IBS Software is focused on digitally transforming the CASS platform to develop an agile platform that can meet payment innovations and customer demands. Focussed on customer experience, the new CASS platform features improvements in real time analytics, self-service capabilities, additional payment options, global accessibility and a fresh modern multi-lingual user interface. The new CASSLink will be rolled out to all other CASS markets from the fourth quarter of 2022 and continuing through 2023.
Air cargo played an outsized role during the pandemic, delivering life-saving vaccines and medical supplies and keeping global supply chains running. Moving forward, it is vital that industry continues to digitally transform to allow payments between parties to be handled quickly, efficiently and with total trust," said Muhammad Albakri, IATA's Senior VP, Financial Settlement and Distribution Services. Our CASSLink platform has already changed the way airlines and third parties interact. We're delighted to have found an excellent partner in IBS Software to power the new CASSLink, ensuring that it continues to be fit for purpose as we head into a new era for air cargo.
"As air cargo grows, so do the challenges for airlines, freight forwarders and other players in handling payments in an increasingly complex value chain. The air cargo industry has a golden opportunity to influence the global supply chain, making payments simpler and more efficient is critical to enticing and keeping customers, It's an honour for us to partner with IATA to modernize its platform and further enhance the value it brings the industry."
-Akshay Shrivastava, Head of Consulting and Digital Transformation at IBS Software
About IBS Software
IBS Software is a leading SaaS solutions provider to the travel industry globally, managing mission-critical operations for customers in the aviation, tour & cruise and hospitality industries. IBS Software's solutions for the aviation industry cover fleet & crew operations, aircraft maintenance, passenger services, loyalty programs, staff travel and air-cargo management. IBS Software also runs a real time B2B and B2C distribution platform providing hotel room inventory, rates and availability to a global network of hospitality companies and channels. For the tour and cruise industry, IBS provides a comprehensive, customer-centric, digital platform that covers onshore, online and on-board solutions. The Consulting and Digital Transformation (CDx) focuses on driving digital transformation initiatives of its customers, leveraging its domain knowledge, digital technologies and engineering excellence. IBS Software is a Blackstone portfolio company and operates from 15 offices across the world. Further information can be found at https://www.ibsplc.com/.
About IATA
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) is the trade association for the world's airlines, representing some 290 airlines or 83% of total air traffic. IATA supports many areas of aviation activity and help formulate industry policy on critical aviation issues.
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