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INDUSTRY NEWS & PEOPLE  July 2007
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Austrian Unveils Private Service
Austrian Airlines has introduced a private jet service enabling transatlantic business-class passengers to fly to any European airport from Vienna with 48 hours notice. Called Austrian Business Jet, the service is offered in conjunction with JetAlliance charter company. Passengers are escorted by members of Austrian’s service team through dedicated passport and security checks. If desired, they can be driven to their aircraft in a limo.
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Avis Offers Chauffeur Service With Rentals
Avis Rent A Car System has launched a new premium service called “Avis Chauffeur Drive” through which Avis customers can rent a car and hire a professional driver at the same time. The new service offers to increase traveler productivity as well as cut back on ground transportation expenses, says Michael Caron, vice president of product and program development for Avis Budget Group, parent of Avis.
“Avis Preferred members can now let a locally-based professional driver worry about traffic, directions, parking and the bags, and the customer can sit back and ... make the most of their business travel time to get their work done,” says Michael Caron, vice president of product and program development for Avis Budget Group, parent of Avis. “And using Avis Chauffeur Drive can also cost less than hiring a sedan from a limousine service, so it saves the customer money, too.” Avis Chauffeur Drive costs $30 per hour with a three-hour minimum, plus standard rental car charges.
The product is the result of an alliance between Avis and WeDriveU Inc., which provides fully insured and certified chauffeurs who provide professional driving services to customers using the customer’s vehicle.
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BA Site Now Able To Compare Prices In Multi-leg Itineraries
British Airways has adopted Amadeus Flex Pricer to enhance the experience of booking connecting flight itineraries through its proprietary web site. BA’s preliminary trial of Flex Pricer resulted in a 50 percent increase over six months in the number of connecting journeys booked on the site.
The Amadeus Flex Pricer system allows customers booking connecting flights to see prices across a seven-day calendar and offers price comparisons across the airline’s range of cabins and services.
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BCD Subsidiary Unveils Vayama International Booking Site
BCD Holdings subsidiary Airtrade International has launched Vayama, a dedicated international travel web site that allows consumers to search from a selection of international airlines, flights and fares to 191 countries, which its management says is larger than any previously available online. Searches are facilitated by an interactive world map and 3-D seat maps.
“If you look at the world of online travel, most Americans are comfortable booking their own domestic trips, but international travel has remained a complicated puzzle,” say Andre Hesselink and Wim Butte, co-CEOs of the company. “That’s why Vayama was built.”
With Vayama, international travelers will be able to book specific fare and route combinations that have never been easy to book online before, such as Iberia from New York to Rome, China Eastern from Los Angeles to Ho Chi Minh or Hawaiian Airlines from San Francisco to Sydney. Vayama also allows international travelers to book flights to other cities and countries beyond their original destination.
By incorporating Ajax technology, flight comparisons on Vayama can be made quickly so that travelers can narrow search results in real-time based on personal preferences such as total travel time, connecting airports and price.
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Caesar Park Anchors ALHI’s Meetings Sites In South America
Associated Luxury Hotels International (ALHI) has expanded its international membership with the addition of its first hotels in South America: Caesar Park Rio de Janeiro – Ipanema in Rio de Janeiro and Caesar Park Buenos Aires in Buenos Aires. The expansion is being made to meet the growing demands of North American meeting planners “in this increasing global marketplace,” according to David Gabri, president and CEO of Associated Luxury Hotels.
The Caesar Park Rio de Janeiro – Ipanema can accommodate up to 200 people for events. Caesar Park Buenos Aires offers five meeting rooms.
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Carey Houston Installs Free Wi-Fi In Vehicles
Carey Houston, a member of the Carey International global franchise system of chauffeured vehicle companies, is installing mobile cellular routers from WAAV in its fleet of vehicles. With the routers, which are able to create their own mobile Wi-Fi hotspots at broadband speeds, all Carey Houston customers will now be able to access the Internet during trips through either a Wi-Fi or ethernet connection.
The new wireless service is offered at no extra charge. It complements the “mobile office” capabilities found in all signature Carey Town Cars: a writing desk, cell phone, 110 volt outlet, satellite radio and extra power points.
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Continental To Help Passengers Buy Their Own Carbon-offsets
By late summer, Continental Airlines plans to offer customers the option to participate in a carbon-offset program. The program will allow travelers booking on Continental.com to calculate the carbon footprint of their booked itinerary and purchase carbon offsets online from Sustainable Travel International, a nonprofit group that will invest the proceeds in projects such as reforestation, renewable energy and energy conservation.
Customers will have the option of selecting what kind of program they would like their carbon offsets to benefit.
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Emirates Adds Water Limo From Venice Int’l Airport
Emirates begins a water limousine airport transfer service this month to complement its non-stop service from Dubai to Venice. The scenic transfer will be available exclusively to Emirates’ First and Business class passengers arriving in and departing from Venice. The ferry service will operate between a dedicated pontoon next to Venice International Airport and the Venetian archipelago.
Travelers normally would take a car from the airport and then require a public water taxi for the final leg of their journeys.
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Empire Begins Building Environmentally-friendly Fleet
EmpireCLS Worldwide Chauffeured Services has begun building its fleet of alternative fuel vehicles, which will be available first in the Los Angeles and New York markets. The company’s plan is to replace its existing nationwide fleet with environmentally friendly vehicles, as they come up for renewal.
So far three Chevrolet Flex Fuel Suburbans and three Lexus RX 400H Hybrids have taken their places in the Empire fleet. Over the next several months, similar purchases will include the GMC Flex Fuel Yukons and bio-diesel fueled mini-coaches. Empire has also been in talks with Lincoln about a livery package for its Flex Fuel Lincoln Town Car.
There are added costs for flex fuel fleets like the one envisioned by Empire; individual vehicles cost about $2,500 more than non-flex fuel vehicles. Plus, availability of alternative fuel is limited right now. But down the road, says a company spokesman, the purchase of flex fuel vehicles “puts us in a better position once the availability increases.” Maintenance so far is not an issue: “Currently we are bringing the flex fuel vehicles into the dealership to be maintained and inspected.”
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Galileo Unveils New Traversa Tool For Corporate Booking
Galileo has introduced Traversa, its “next generation” corporate booking tool, designed to capitalize on the ease-of-use and familiarity of the Orbitz consumer booking platform “with the control and content corporate travel requires.” Among the capabilities expressly for the corporate travel market:
• application of policies based on individual situations at the time of booking;
• control of how rates are displayed and shopped via sophisticated policy settings;
• clear and instant display of preferred vendors and in- and out-of-policy choices;
• application of policy settings for non-GDS content.
Other new tools include:
• air, car and hotel in the same booking path, with pre-populated fields based on prior travel selections;
• display of unused ticket value on the home page;
• ability to compare schedules and fares from up to 9 airports simultaneously;
• Lowest logical airfare search that minimizes illogical flights, such as more connections or long layovers when there is only a small dollar difference;
• seat maps showing what seats are available before selecting flight;
• ability to add trips to calendar or Blackberry;
• hotel search by company office locations; view search results plotted on map by policy; show standard and company negotiated rates, see sold out hotels, view rate changes during stay.
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Hertz Loves NYC; New List Of Green Initiatives Proves It
Hertz has announced that it is making a $1 million donation to the National Park Foundation plus a $250,000 donation to benefit the Mayor’s Fund for the Advancement of New York City, in recognition of the Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s environmental efforts.
Additionally, Hertz is expanding its Green Collection, a fleet of fuel-efficient, family-sized vehicles, with a planned $68 million investment in 3,400 Toyota Prius hybrid vehicles, 100 of which will be designated for Manhattan.
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Icelandair Simplifies Fare Structure
Icelandair is implementing a simplified pricing structure for travel to and from Iceland. There will be four fare categories: Saga, Economy Flex, Economy and Best Price. All fares will be combinable, allowing passengers to fly one way in one category and return in another.
Saga passengers will get priority check-in and seat selection, use of airport lounge facilities, extra-baggage allowance, easier cancellation and itinerary changes, and additional frequent-flyer points (four times more than lowest economy fare). Economy Flex passengers will receive similar benefits and 50 percent more frequent-flyer points than lowest economy fare. Economy passengers get choice of seating and 25 percent more miles than Best Price fares, but will be charged for itinerary changes and cancellations.
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JetBlue Offers Onboard Flight-tracking Tool
JetBlue Airways has partnered with Google Maps to provide customers with a real-time flight tracking channel on its seatback televisions to map the aircraft’s route. The map feature will be located on channel 13 of JetBlue’s in-seat satellite TV system. In addition to in-flight tracking, customers can refer people to JetBlue.com, where their flights can be tracked live using Google’s technology.
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Jets.com Enhances Logistics Software For One-Way Charters
Jets.com has implemented new capabilities into its logistics software package to help operators plan more efficient point-to-point patterns that best position their fleets, and giving Jets.com customers more and better jet choices at market-driven prices. The new issue helps fill idle and empty leg time with paying customers.
Through Jets.com, jet operators post the anticipated locations of their jets directly from their electronic schedule boards along with their pricing information. The result: maximized charter revenue for the jet owner and more affordable one-way pricing for the passenger.
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Marriott, Ian Schrager Team Up To Develop New Boutique Brand
Marriott International is partnering with Ian Schrager, considered the father of the boutique hotel concept, to create a boutique brand. The hotels will be located in gateway cities throughout North and South America, Europe and Asia. The initial list of markets to be explored includes New York, Miami, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, San Diego, Boston, and Las Vegas in the U.S.; London, Paris, Berlin, Frankfurt, Madrid, Barcelona, Milan and Rome in Europe; and Beijing, Shanghai, Singapore, Bangkok, Seoul and Tokyo in Asia.
Hotels will have 150 to 200 rooms. The partners will divide responsibilities for rolling out the brand, with Schrager leading the effort on concept, design, marketing, branding and food and beverage. Marriott will oversee the development process and operate and manage the completed hotels. The partners expect to have at least five development deals signed under the new brand by the end of 2007 and 100 hotels open or in the pipeline within a decade. In 1984, Schrager opened the Morgans Hotel in New York, which many consider to be the first boutique hotel.
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NJ’s Touch Of Class Limos Also Plans Free Wi-Fi Service
Touch of Class Transportation of Princeton, N.J., has ordered wireless Internet access equipment from WAAV of Cambridge, Mass., for immediate installation into its entire fleet of vehicles. Touch of Class customers will be able to access the Internet during trips through a Wi-Fi or ethernet connection. The value-added service will be offered at no charge.
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ACTE Names Keynoter For Singapore Conference
The Association of Corporate Travel Executives has announced that Ed Cohen, senior vice president of Satyam Computer Services's Satyam School of Leadership will provide a keynote presentation at the Association's 2007 Asia-Pacific Education Conference in Singapore on August 22-23. Cohen will discuss how companies have revived innovation and accomplishment by assuming efficient value creation tactics for guiding and empowering a diversified workforce operating in different countries, cultures and time zones.
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ACTE Urges US Government To OK In-flight Communications
The Association of Corporate Travel Executives (ACTE) said enhanced in-flight communication services are coming, and it’s time to start shaping them now, while they are in the developmental stage. ACTE mentioned an announcement by Airbus that European passengers will soon be able to use cell phones and BlackBerry devices in flight. That may give business travelers flying on aircraft built by Airbus a boost in productivity, and give a marketing advantage to carriers that offer the service, said ACTE. The decision to make in-flight cell service a reality rests with the Federal Communications Commission, which ended a three-year proceeding to lift the cell ban in March 2007, based on the determination that there was insufficient information as to whether the use of wireless devices on aircraft would disrupt wireless installations on the ground. At present, the Federal Aviation Administration also bans the in-flight use of wireless devices because of potential interference with avionics.
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Advito Unveils Enhanced Hotel, Air Program Management Tools
Advito, the independent consulting division of BCD Travel, is unveiling a series of enhancements to its hotel and air program management services and tools. Some changes are targeted to a global market, including translation of its eValuation Service into German, French and Spanish as well as English.
The eValuation service integrates travel agency supplier and client data from over 400 global organizations with additional qualitative and quantitative information gathered via an online survey. The proprietary eValuation Service then analyzes each participant’s travel program in six key categories and 36 sub-categories. The benchmarking results are presented in an in-depth eValuation Report that provides actionable recommendations for improvement.
Advito's enhanced Air Contract Scorecard provides improved air program management and measurement tools: new year-over-year data metrics and graphical dashboards. The changes reduce the amount of time needed to study statistical reports. Trends by carrier, market, carrier savings, contract targets versus actual, and Quality of Service (QSI) information, are depicted in easily-understood formats.
It is also introducing the RFP Decision Suite, an expanded hotel procurement and management suite designed to improve the quality and efficiency of the RFP negotiation cycle. The enhancements allow Advito experts to deliver comprehensive alternatives and solutions to clients in faster, easy to read graphical formats throughout the procurement and program development process. The suite’s key components include:
o A mapping/solicitation tool improves the quality of the solicitation lists developed at the start of the RFP process. Graphical displays of key data such as historical rates offered and paid, rate benchmarking, and other key property information are provided in an easy-to-view mapping format that facilitates faster analytical decisions. The end result is a hotel solicitation list that offers the best possible coverage in relation to key hotel stay requirements around the world.
o The RFP decision model converts offers from hundreds of individual properties into simple recommendations based on a client-specific scoring system. It also offers a unique true cost of stay calculation; and captures and stores comments from decision makers regarding the offers.
o Savings, compliance and rate-paid benchmarking information delivered in the Executive Summary Dashboard.
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Air India Ready To Launch NYC-Mumbai Service
Air India will introduce daily, nonstop service from New York's JFK International Airport to Mumbai starting August 1. The new service will feature the state-of-the-art Boeing 777-200LR (longer range) aircraft, equipped with the latest in-flight features, including on-demand audio and video entertainment in each seat. The flight from New York to Mumbai last just over 15 hours.
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AKA Adds Two Extended-stay Properties
AKA, a luxury extended-stay brand, has added two East Coast properties: AKA Times Square, its fourth Manhattan location; and AKA Virginia Square in Arlington, Va. AKA has residences in Philadelphia, New York (four), Washington DC, Arlington, Va., and White Plains, NY. It plans to own and operate 20 properties worldwide by 2010.
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Alaska Introduces Credit Card Option For Onboard Purchases
Alaska Airlines has rolled out technology that gives customers the option to use credit and debit cards instead of cash for onboard purchases. The airline introduced point-of-sale devices this month on 22 daily, transcontinental flights. The hand-held units allow flight attendants to process credit and debit card payments when customers buy food and beverages and rent personal entertainment players. Alaska will phase in the payment option on more flights this fall and ultimately plans to offer the service on all flights.
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ALHI Adds Rome's Grand Hotel To Meetings Portfolio
The Grand Hotel Parco Dei Principi in Rome has entered Associated Luxury Hotels International (ALHI) portfolio of hotels for the meetings and incentive industries. It is ALHI's first member in Italy
The Grand Hotel Parco Dei Principi border of the historic Borghese Gardens, where you can admire its art collection with masterpieces by Raphael, Rubens, Bernini and Canova. The hotel has been dramatically refurbished, and now features a luxurious and elegant look reminiscent of the patrician villas owned by Rome’s nobility in the late 17th century.
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Amadeus Adds Functionality To E-Travel Booking Tool
The new version of Amadeus e-Travel Management offers the Amadeus Quick Shopper user interface, an unused ticket indicator, the ability to search for air by arrival time and additional direct links to external travel providers, all within the context of the customer’s corporate travel program.
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Amadeus Refines e-Travel Booking Tool
Amadeus has launched the latest version of its e-Travel Management online booking solution for corporations, with the Amadeus Quick Shopper user interface, an unused ticket indicator, the ability to search for air by arrival time, and additional direct links to external travel providers.
The ability to access localized services that have been named preferred suppliers includes the ability to link to select carbon management suppliers so travelers can measure the environmental impact of their trips.
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Amadeus Signs Rail Distribution Pact
Amadeus has signed a deal with Wandrian, a specialist in rail distribution technology, to distribute rail content to travel agents outside Europe. Through the web-based Amadeus RailAgent, travel agents can book global rail passes and point-to-point tickets for travel in Europe, the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and India. Amadeus RailAgent is integrated into the travel agency back-office system for tracking, accounting and billing purposes.
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American Express Adds Reporting Tool, MIS Support
American Express Business Travel has unveiled its new web-based data reporting solution, American Express Axis @ Work, and introduced a new management information practice area within its Advisory Services group. Axis @ Work builds on and advances its predecessor solution (American Express @ Work Reporting) with enhanced user navigation and reporting capabilities such as an intuitive graphic user interface, dashboards featuring key indicators, standard reports to simplify information gathering and customizable reports.
In other American Express news, the company acquired the remaining 63 percent of shares in Farrington American Express Travel Services Ltd. in Hong Kong. The former joint venture is a wholly owned travel management venture. In October 1999, Farrington Travel and American Express established a joint venture in which Farrington Travel maintained the majority equity stake.
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American Express Partners With InsureMyTrip
American Express has formed a partnership with InsureMyTrip.com that allows InsureMyTrip to offer packages of Global Travel Shield, a collection of travel insurance products, to US residents. Two packages of insurance products will be available at InsureMyTrip.com with prices at $32 and $42 per person.
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American To Apply For Chicago-Beijing Route
American Airlines will apply to the U.S. Department of Transportation to serve a nonstop route between Chicago and Beijing, effective March 25, 2009. A new agreement between the U.S. and China to expand airline service between the two countries prompted American to apply for the route.
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American Upgrading, Increasing Service To London's Airports
American Airlines plans to upgrade and increase its service to London in the coming months by moving some of its Gatwick flights to London Heathrow Airport, as well as adding a new route between New York and London’s Stansted Airport (STN). As a result, American will fly as many as 20 roundtrips a day between the United States and London once all the changes are in place.
American said it will begin serving London’s Heathrow Airport (LHR) from both Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW) and Raleigh/Durham, N.C. (RDU), effective March 29, 2008. The new route between New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) and London’s Stansted Airport is effective October 28, 2007. American plans to switch one of its two daily DFW roundtrips to London Heathrow, while the other DFW roundtrip will retain its current service to London Gatwick. American’s one daily Raleigh/Durham-to-London flight will also switch to Heathrow from Gatwick. The airline’s DFW-to-London service to both Heathrow and Gatwick will continue to be flown with three-class (First, Business and Economy/Coach) Boeing 777 aircraft with 245 seats. American’s Raleigh/Durham service will also continue to be flown with Boeing 777 aircraft. American’s JFK-Stansted service will be flown with two-class (Business and Economy/Coach) Boeing 767-300 aircraft with 221 seats, including 30 Next Generation Business Class seats.
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American Widens Window For Changing Flights On Day Of Departure
American Airlines’ customers can now request a confirmed seat on an earlier or later flight on the day they’re scheduled to travel within 12 hours of the scheduled departure time of the alternate flight. The previous window for a confirmed flight change was three hours prior to departure.
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ARC Set To Launch Debit Memo Tool
According to Airlines Reporting Corp. (ARC), 61 airlines have expressed their intent to use ARC Memo Manager, a tool that automates the distribution and settlement of debit and credit memos. ARC plans to launch the tool this summer. Northwest and Alaska Airlines are the only major U.S. airlines that have committed to use the product.
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Arcaneo And Visa Partner On Meetings Integration
Visa and Arcaneo have formed a strategic alliance aimed at helping companies integrate commercial payment cards with Arcaneo’s meetings management technology. The companies said the use of Visa commercial payment cards in combination with Arcaneo’s meeting planning tools can help companies centralize internal processes for purchasing, data tracking and reporting on meeting expenses.
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Atlas Travel Launches Booking Tool For Small Businesses
Atlas Travel International, based in Milford, Mass., has developed BookBizTravel.com for corporations with annual unmanaged travel spend of under $250,000. Atlas says BookBizTravel.com offers companies a low-cost online booking tool, access to travel agent assistance, real-time reporting, flight tracking and account reviews to maximize savings.
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Atlas Travel Unveils Real-time Benchmarking Service
Atlas Travel International has unveiled its Travel GPA benchmarking service, which used patent-pending algorithms to produce a travel report card based on pre-defined goals and metrics. Initially, the service will use real-time data from seven major TMCs.
The report card provides three grades to measure performance; Goal Metrics GPA, Industry Benchmark GPA and an overall Travel GPA. "Report Card presents a 360 degree analysis of a company’s travel performance based on user defined goals, statistical benchmarks against peers, including air, car rental, and hotel average cost expenditures, and top airline markets and carrier comparisons, to arrive at an overall grade point average," says Rock Blanco, Atlas's CIO. "In the end you are given a rating in each category that ranges from ’needs improvement’ to ‘excellent’ — giving you exact knowledge of how you stack up against your peers."
Travel GPA is slated for release to TMCs in late summer 2007. Initially, they will need to subscribe to Cornerstone’s iBank Travel Management System. "We use the data distribution capability in their iBank reporting and analysis application to quickly aggregate massive amounts of travel data and deliver a much-needed service to the TMC community and the companies that they service," says Blanco. "We are able to leverage years of industry knowledge and transaction data in just seconds."
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Avis Introduces Booking Tool For Wireless Devices, Adds Hybrids To Fleet
Avis has unveiled an online booking tool that lets customers make, check or change their reservations online with any Internet-enabled portable device through a special version of Avis.com. To use the new service, customers enter the standard Avis.com address into the browser address window on their handheld devices. The Avis servers automatically recognize the information request as coming from a handheld device, and respond with only the minimum information fields and text messages necessary to make, check or change an Avis reservation.
In other Avis news, the company has added 500 Nissan Altima Hybrid vehicles at locations in California. Avis added 1,000 Toyota Priuses, also a hybrid vehicle, to its rental fleet earlier this summer. The Prius is available at locations in California; Portland, Ore.; Seattle; and Washington, DC. The Prius will also be available in Boston, Chicago, Dallas, New York and Philadelphia by the end of the year.
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BookingBuilder Hooks Up With Worldspan
BookingBuilder Technologies, a provider of a point-of-sale desktop application for travel agents, has partnered with Worldspan to offer the GDS’s subscribers in the US and Canada preferred access to the BookingBuilder desktop for shopping and booking travel products from supplier websites.
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BridgeStreet Forms Corporate Housing Alliance
BridgeStreet Worldwide has restructured its existing licensed partnership into an international alliance of corporate housing providers, the BridgeStreet Global Alliance. "We have assembled a team of industry experts who are placed strategically in key cities to assess client demand for specific locations and perform rigorous due diligence on potential global alliance members," says BridgeStreet CEO Lee Curtis. Members work through a certification process, graduating to the status of Certified Partner. BridgeStreet's highest level of participation, Premier Global Alliance Partner, applies to providers who participate in the US-based Licensed Global Partner program.
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British Airways To Connect Texas Cities With Heathrow
British Airways will move its Dallas/Fort Worth flights to London Heathrow from London Gatwick, beginning March 30, 2008, when the EU-US open-skies aviation agreement takes effect. In addition to the daily flight from Dallas/Fort Worth, there will be two flights each day to Heathrow from Houston’s Bush Intercontinental Airport.
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Carey Launches Alliance Network
Carey International, a provider of chauffeured ground transportation, has launched the Carey Alliance Network, an extended network of partners that operates in locations outside of the 250 major business centers worldwide serviced by Carey’s branded franchise operations. Combined, Carey says, its franchise network and alliance network offer service in 550 cities and 65 countries. When they book, Carey customers are informed whether they will be serviced by a Carey-branded operation or a partner in the Carey Alliance Network.
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Carlson Increases Stake In CWT India, Gains Majority Control
Carlson Wagonlit Travel (CWT) has acquired an additional 26 percent stake in its Indian joint venture from AFL Private Ltd., giving it majority control of the joint venture with a 76 percent ownership stake. AFL Private Ltd. will continue to be the remaining shareholder.
Praveen Gandhi will continue to serve as chief executive officer if CWT India, while Cyrus Guzder, chairman, AFL Private Ltd., will remain chairman of the board. The company has 12 offices across 10 cities and more than 800 employees.
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Carlson Wagonlit Launches Ground Transportation Consultancy
Carlson Wagonlit Travel has added ground transportation to its repertoire of program optimization services. CWT consultants strategically analyze a company’s global ground transportation spending using analytical tools, industry experience and a proprietary database. CWT says it can assist clients in all aspects of the process, from creating RFPs to managing the negotiations process. Leading the ground transportation practice is Dave Kilduff, who joined CWT in April as the managing director of the new discipline. Kilduff brings to his new role more than 25 years of industry experience, most recently at American Express.
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Catalina To Turn Dorset Into "Hip" Business Hotel
The Catalina Hotel & Beach Club, a boutique hotel in Miami Beach, has acquired the Dorset Hotel and intends to convert it into a "hip haven" for business travelers. The Dorset is next door to the Catalina and will now be under the Catalina brand name. The 190-room hotel will remain open during renovations, and a grand opening for its business traveler suites is planned for fall 2007. Each suite will be equipped with office supplies and free wireless Internet access. In addition to a spacious, well-lit desk area in each suite, guests in the new executive building may utilize the services of Catalina's personal office assistants, who will print presentations, conduct research or handle other administrative tasks.
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China Southern Unveils No-Fee Changeable Ticket
China Southern Airlines is launching "one-ticket" service for the Guangzhou-Shenzhen and Beijing-Shanghai city pairs for first and business class travel. With One Ticket Service, passengers can change the time of departure or destination from Guangzhou to Shenzhen or Shenzhen to Guangzhou (same between Beijing and Shanghai) as well as the date of travel, at no charge. Ticket class of service cannot be changed.
Changes must be made within a three-day window: one day prior to departure, the departure day and one day after.
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Commonwealth Worldwide Adds Hybrids To Fleet
Commonwealth Worldwide Chauffeured Transportation has introduced hybrid vehicles to its fleet of cars. Boston and New York customers can enjoy chauffeured service in the four-passenger Toyota Prius Hybrid.
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Concur Adds Worldspan Reprice To Cliqbook, Offers Partnerships
Worldspan and Concur have jointly announced the deployment of Worldspan Rapid Reprice technology through Concur's Cliqbook Travel, a corporate booking tool. According to Worldspan, this implementation marks the first time a ticket repricing solution will become available for use across multiple GDSs through a corporate online booking solution.
In other Concur news, the company has launched the Concur Travel Management Company (TMC) Partner Program. The program enables participating TMCs to deliver Concur’s travel and expense-management tools to their clients.
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Continental Launches Mont-Tremblant Service
Continental Airlines will begin seasonal service between Newark and Mont-Tremblant, Canada, on Dec. 14. Mont-Tremblant is a ski destination. Service will be daily, except during the period of Jan. 8 to Feb. 13, when flights will not operate on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
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Continental, Kingfisher Partnering On US-India Service
Continental Airlines and India's Kingfisher Airlines have entered into a comprehensive partnership that will begin on October 1 with reciprocal frequent flyer program and airport lounge access. That's the same day the Continental will launch daily non-stop flights between Newark Liberty International Airport and Mumbai; it has operated Newark-Delhi service since 2005.
The two airline's plan to begin codesharing by the end of the year. Continental will place its code on Kingfisher flights connecting to Continental’s daily flights between New York and Delhi and new service between New York and Mumbai.
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Cornerstone Releases Pre-trip Authorization, Rescheduling Tools
Cornerstone Information Systems has released two new applications, Pre-Travel Authorization (PTA) and Schedule Change Manager (SCM). They are a part of Cornerstone’s reservations and data management platforms that are in use by more than 500 corporations and travel management companies. PTA automates the process of securing authorization for business travel before reservations are ticketed. SCM automates the process of managing the numerous amounts of schedule change notices received by the travel professional. When combined with Cornerstone’s iQCX, it can be configured to approve schedule changes based on each customer's unique requirements and take specific action on the schedule changes that require attention.
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Croatia Airlines, United Sign Codeshare Deal
United Airlines and Croatia Airlines have signed a codeshare agreement, subject to US government approval. United will offer codeshare flights to the Croatian cities of Zagreb, Split and Dubrovnik. Croatia Airlines customers will get codeshare service to Washington Dulles, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Chicago.
Both airlines are members of the Star Alliance. United is a founding member, and Croatia Airlines has been a regional member since 2004.
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Crowne Plaza Web Site Includes Virtual Meeting Environment
InterContinental Hotels Group's Crowne Plaza brand has launched a virtual world to its web site, and making it available to companies for virtual meetings. Labeled Second Life Island — The Place to Meet, the online meeting site has been designed by Spunlogic, an interactive marketing and technology company.
Three distinct meetings spaces are available on Crowne Plaza's The Place to Meet island. Each is equipped with streaming audio, video, presentation and image viewing capacities. The Executive Room is a traditional conference room space with a round table, providing seating for up to 12 attendees. The Lounge Room features a bar area with several couches and chairs and windows overlooking the lush greenery; the space is ideal for informal gatherings, with seating for up to 20 attendees. The Theatre Room is designed to accommodate large audiences, able to seat more than 30 attendees, and configurable into a variety of formats and speaking situations.
Rooms may be reserved — and presentations and guest lists uploaded — from the Crowne Plaza website. The island also has a virtual meeting director ("Maggie"), who is available during normal business hours to assist with reservations.
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Delta Lobbies For Atlanta-Shanghai Service
Delta has launched its bid to offer nonstop service between Atlanta and Shanghai, following the US Department of Transportation’s request for airlines to apply for future service to China. The airline has stated its case at NextGatewayToChina.com. Delta plans to provide daily service using Boeing 777 aircraft in a two-class configuration.
Delta plans to introduce fully horizontal lie-flat seats on its Boeing 777 fleet beginning in 2008.
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Delta To Cross-sell Hilton Rooms Through Its Web Site
Delta Air Lines and Hilton Hotels Corporation have integrated their marketing efforts so that Delta customers an also make hotel reservations with a Hilton Family hotel on delta.com or via a Delta reservation agent. SkyMiles members who reserve their hotel rooms through these booking channels will earn miles and become eligible for special promotions.
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Dolce Adds Meeting Facility Near Valley Forge
Dolce International is adding its 26th property in its portfolio of hotel, resort & conference Destinations. Located just outside Philadelphia and branded Dolce Valley Forge, the 346-room facility offers 21,000 square feet of flexible meeting space for business meetings, training sessions, weekend retreats and social or corporate events. Plans are currently underway for a $17 million refurbishment, including the addition of 6,500 square feet of dedicated meeting space, scheduled for completion by June 2008.
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Dolce Gets New Owners, Will Focus On Management Business
Dolce International, an operator of hotel and conference centers, has announced a recapitalization that will allow the company to reposition itself as purely a management company, and to grow the brand internationally. Under the terms of the deal, principals of Broadreach Capital Partners have agreed to acquire 85 percent of Dolce International for an undisclosed sum. Dolce management will hold the remaining 15 percent stake. The 85 percent equity stake was bought from exiting investors AEW Capital Management and Soros Real Estate Investors. Dolce says the deal gives it a partner with extensive experience in building operating companies, committed to growing the company and further positioning the brand within the conference center industry.
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El Al Stresses Comfort In New 777s For NYC-Tel Aviv Route
EL AL is adding two new Boeing 777 aircraft to its New York-Tel Aviv route. The first planes inauguration will take place on July 25; the second will be next month. The new 777s have been designed with spacious cabins, mood lighting and state-of-the-art personal digital entertainment systems offered to all passengers. First and Platinum Business class seats will have expanded recline options, an articulating arm, a personal reading light with a dimmer, a large one-piece tray table, an individual cocktail table, a coat hook and a 110-volt PC power outlet. First Class will feature adjustable, wide flat-bed seats with a 77-inch pitch (reclining to a full horizontal position), a complementary sleep suit and a personal shoe compartment.
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Enterprise Teams Up With Alternative Fuel Provider
As part of a partnership to promote the increased availability and use of alternative fuels and technologies throughout the US, Enterprise Rent-A-Car is designating its premier rental location in Washington, DC, as an official E85/FlexFuel branch. The news is tied to the announcement that Enterprise partners VeraSun Energy (one of the largest producers of ethanol in the US), General Motors (GM), the US Department of Energy and the US Environmental Protection Agency have joined forces to make VeraSun’s E85 fuel available to the general public for the first time in Washington.
Enterprise has 41,000 FlexFuel vehicles, cars and trucks that have the ability to burn E85, a blend of 85 percent ethanol and 15 percent gasoline. Nationally, Enterprise is actively deploying as many of its FlexFuel vehicles as possible near E85 fueling stations in order to increase the number of cars being fueled with E85.
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Eos Opens Lounge At London Stansted
Eos Airlines, which operates an all-premium-class transatlantic service, has opened Club 48, its new gate-side departure lounge at London Stansted Airport. Club 48 has two wide-screen televisions, individual computer workstations, wireless Internet access, a bar and food services. There are secluded seating areas with translucent divider screens.
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Expedia Corporate Travel Expands To Italy
Expedia Corporate Travel (ECT) plans to launch service in Italy. Companies will have access to localized service and online booking and travel management tools in Italian. ECT has partnered with L’Orchidea Viaggi, a travel management company, to provide local fulfillment services. Italy will be ECT’s fifth European point of sale, adding to its existing presence in France, Germany, the U.K. and Belgium.
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Expedia Corporate Travel Introduces Adoption Guarantee
Expedia Corporate Travel has announced its "75 by 75 Guarantee", which pledges that new customers will achieve 75 percent online adoption within 75 days of implementing the online booking tool, or Expedia Corporate Travel will provide a full refund on all online and agent-assisted transaction fees. According to Jean-Pierre Remy, president of Expedia Corporate Travel, the company's North American customers have online adoption rates in excess of 85 percent.
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Expedia Launches Direct-Connect For Independent Hotels
Expedia Inc. has introduced QuickConnect, an interface that allows hotel partners to link their property management and central reservation systems to Expedia. Through QuickConnect, Expedia says, independent hotels and small-to-medium-sized hotel chains can automate the exchange of room, rate and booking information with Expedia-owned web sites. Expedia says QuickConnect was developed to be less complex than integration projects used for large chains.
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FCm Opens Dubai Office
FCm Travel Solutions has consolidated its presence in the Middle East with the opening of a company-owned office in Dubai through its parent business, Flight Centre Ltd. FCm says Dubai had been identified in its growth plan as a strategic market offering significant business potential.
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First Capella Hotel Opens
Capella, a luxury hotel brand launched by former Ritz-Carlton executive Horst Schulze, has opened its first hotel, Schloss Velden, in a lakeside locale beneath the Alps in Velden, Austria. Schloss Velden’s chateau has 39 guest rooms, a fine dining room and a wine cellar. A contemporary addition houses 66 rooms and 45 private residences as well as Auriga, the brand name for Capella’s spa and wellness facility.
In August, Capella Castlemartyr in County Cork, Ireland, will be the brand‘s second hotel to open. The 109-suite resort is set on 220 acres in the country village of Castlemartyr and encompasses a restored manor house adjacent to the ruins of a 1,000-year-old castle. It will also feature an Auriga spa.
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FLO Corp. Signs Registered Traveler Deal With HRG
Travel management company HRG North America has signed an agreement with registered traveler (RT) provider FLO Corp. to provide HRG North America customers with RT services. The FLO (fast lane option) solution helps frequent business travelers pass through airport security quickly. In addition to expedited security lane services, it is testing a remote airport baggage check-in in Boston.
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FLO Offers Corporate Discounts For Registered Traveler Service
The FLO Corporation is offering discounts of up to 35 percent to travelers who pre-enroll in its Registered Traveler service at the Denver, Atlanta and Washington, DC airports. Corporations can qualify for the discount by signing a non-binding letter of intent by July 20. All three airports will be implementing RT in the coming months.
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Former Innkeepers CEO Launches Two Companies
Jeffrey Fisher, former CEO of Innkeepers USA, has formed two companies to develop, acquire and operate hotels in the United States. Innkeepers, a hotel real estate investment trust (REIT), recently was acquired by affiliates of Apollo Investment Corporation. The two new companies are Fisher Property Group, which will develop and acquire hotels, and Island Hospitality Management, a hotel management company that will operate the 79 hotels previously managed by Innkeepers Hospitality and all hotels acquired or developed by Fisher Property Group.
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Frontier Targets New BusinessCard To Small Businesses
Frontier Airlines has extended its consumer credit card relationship with Barclays to offer to its small-business customers the Frontier Airlines MasterCard BusinessCard. Like the consumer version of the credit card, the new business card offers 12,500 bonus miles upon activation, plus one mile for every dollar spent on regular purchases and two miles for every dollar spent on Frontier Airlines purchases. For a $49 annual fee, the business card offers expense-management and spend-tracking features, and a credit line of up to $50,000.
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Furnished Quarters Adds Jersey City Apartments
Furnished Quarters, a New York-based corporate housing provider, has signed an exclusive deal with Jersey City’s newest luxury apartment complex, Grove Pointe. Furnished Quarters apartments at Grove Pointe will be available starting July 20. The company now has more than 200 apartments in Northern New Jersey, bringing the company’s total inventory to over 1,000 furnished apartments in the Northeast.
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Furnished Quarters Adds Units In Boston
Furnished Quarters, a provider of furnished apartments, has added apartments in Garrison Square, a luxury apartment residence complex in Boston, to its inventory. With this latest deal, Furnished Quarters now has more than 1,000 fully furnished apartments in the Northeast.
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Galileo Unveils New Version Of Desktop
Galileo has launched Galileo Desktop 2.0 in the Americas. The latest release includes enhancements to both user interfaces: Focalpoint, the cryptic booking tool, and Viewpoint, the graphical user interface (GUI) booking tool.
Viewpoint will now include additional functionality such as complete pricing, access to hotel leisure rates and advanced passenger information, all of which were previously only available within Focalpoint. Agencies can customize their desktop by displaying agency-specific terminology and tailoring style sheets and business workflow processes. They can also send customer itineraries via e-mail in the language of their choice and include their agency branding.
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Garber To Roll Out G2’s New Agent Desktop
Garber Travel has contracted to employ G2 Switchworks’ new agent desktop, G2Agent, throughout its network of US travel agency locations for shopping, booking and servicing capabilities for their corporate and leisure customers. Along with automated refunds and exchanges and a one-click low-fare search, G2Agent lets agents switch from the G2 application to the agency’s GDS.
Garber recently joined FCm Travel Solutions, a global corporate travel management network.
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GDSX Adds Calendar Service
GDSX, a software developer specializing in specializing in the automation of quality control, reservation finishing and fulfillment services, has integrated the Infotriever Add to Calendar service. The tool enables the automatic updating of itineraries into travelers’ desktop and PDA calendars such as Microsoft Outlook and Lotus Notes. The calendar function is now available to all GDSX Compleat customers.
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GDSX Signs 3 Agencies For Its Touchless Fulfillment Capability
GDSX Ltd. has signed three new agencies to use its COMPLEAT travel platform: CI Travel, based in Norfolk, VA; Andavo Travel, a Colorado-based affiliate of BCD Travel; and World Travel Inc., based in Pennsylvania. COMPLEAT enables subscribers to define and implement fully-automated processes of touchless travel fulfillment, CRM and service delivery. It is able to process reservations in more than 31 countries.
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Gelco, Travelocity Business Integrate To Target Gov't Sector
Gelco Expense Management and Travelocity Business have agreed to integrate Travelocity Business’ booking data into Gelco's ExpenseLink expense-management solution. This relationship builds upon existing integration efforts Gelco and Travelocity have been pursuing in the government travel sector. Gelco and Travelocity Business clients will be able to capture data and expenses booked through Travelocity Business’ online booking tool or travel agents, matching the booked data with actual spending.
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GetThere Adds Ground Transportation Booking
Through an exclusive online relationship with GroundRez, corporate travelers using the GetThere corporate self-booking tool can now book black cars, sedans and limousines in cities across North America and Europe. A reserved taxi service is also available.
GroundRez acts as a technology switch and management tool that funnels ground options from more than 2,000 providers in a concise layout that facilitates product and price comparisons. Preferred ground transportation providers are highlighted in the display. Once the reservation is booked, confirmations and itineraries are sent via e-mail. Travelers have direct online access to view existing reservations and can cancel or make changes to a reservation.
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GetThere Launches Mobile Booking Service
GetThere later this year will offer business travelers the capability to book and manage trips via their hand-held devices. GetThere2go will seamlessly replicate a corporation’s travel site on any web-enabled mobile device, allowing road warriors to book flights, add an extra hotel night or rent a car -- all within corporate policy guidelines. To facilitate this new service for its client base, GetThere has entered into a relationship with Usablenet. GetThere2go will be available to an initial group of GetThere customers in August, with plans to roll it out to all clients and resellers later this year.
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GroundRez Unveils Comprehensive Ground Transport Booking Tool
GroundRez, a managed corporate travel solution for managing and booking all ground transportation services worldwide, has launched, revealing its abilities to efficiently price, compare and book limo, executive sedan, taxi, van and parking services.
GroundRez can be easily integrated into a company’s existing online travel site or existing travel agency software, making it accessible in the same area employees already go to for airline and hotel bookings. There is no need for users to re-login or re-key data as profile information is seamlessly transferred behind the scenes. Once a reservation is booked, employees are sent email confirmations and itineraries.
GroundRez' travel policy product, GroundPolicy, allows a corporation to apply rights to individual travelers, divisions, subsidiaries and/or locations. Adherence to theses policies can be reported on for a quick read analysis.
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Hilton Garden Inn Offers In-room Breakfast Year-round
Hilton Garden Inn has made its Bed ’N Breakfast package available throughout the year. The Bed ’N Breakfast offer includes a cooked-to-order breakfast for each adult staying in the same room. Until recently, the Bed ’N Breakfast was only available November through March. The Bed ’N Breakfast package can be booked online at StayHGI.com.
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Hilton To Refurbish Fort Shelby Hotel In Detroit
Hilton Hotels Corp. and MCP Development will renovate the Fort Shelby Hotel in downtown Detroit and open a 204-room Doubletree Guest Suites hotel by late 2008 after completing an $82 million redevelopment. The restoration will include 63 luxury apartments and a conference center. The Pick-Fort Shelby Hotel enjoyed its heyday during the early 20th century. It opened in two phases in 1917 and 1927. The hotel offered patrons many new innovations for its time, including baths with running water and modern heating in each room. During the past 35 years, the site has been primarily vacant and neglected. The building’s last tenant was a bar that closed its doors in 1998.
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HRG Launches CO2 Calculator For North America
Hogg Robinson Group’s (HRG) independent HRG Consulting division has launched its proprietary CO2 Calculator, which allows North American clients to determine the environmental impact of their travel choices. The tool is being offered free. The original version of the CO2 Calculator was launched in Europe in February. The tool, enhanced for the North American market, includes the ability to compare, in graphical and numerical report formats, the environmental impact of a business trip made by air, rail or car (both petrol and diesel) to decide whether a "greener" travel option might be available or more suitable. It also calculates the cost of a carbon offset for an individual business trip in U.S. and Canadian dollars.
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iJET Granted Wider Patent On Risk Management Service
iJET Intelligent Risk Systems has been granted an enhancement to the original patent for on its Worldcue risk management solution by the US Patent and Trademark Office (PTO). The action, termed a continuation by the PTO, broadens iJET's existing patent to include the method by which the company acquires, analyzes and utilizes travel information.
iJET has also been notified of final allowance for its Global Asset Risk Management System and Method. The systems and methods protected by iJET's first patent are aimed at protecting travelers; the second addresses risks to an organization's people, facilities, supply chains and other physical assets worldwide.
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International SOS Adds SMA, Risk Ratings To Travel Locator Service
International SOS, a provider of travel, medical and security assistance to corporations, has enhanced its online Traveler Locator Service with two new features: Short Message Service (SMS) and Custom Risk Ratings. The new SMS communications platform enables International SOS clients to send short text messages to their global travelers, enabling quick communication during a crisis. International SOS says the new platform has proven particularly popular among companies in the aerospace, pharmaceutical and energy industries.
The Custom Risk Ratings service enables client administrators to reassign International SOS medical, security or combined risk ratings to reflect unique situations that create a different risk profile for their specific organization. The Traveler Locator System then factors the customized ratings into its notification and reporting capability.
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KDS Partners With Ariba
Ariba is integrating its spending management solutions with KDS's corporate self-booking tool to enable companies to combine travel with other spending categories and use a single solution for sourcing, procurement, invoicing, expense, reimbursement and analysis. Ariba says the new offering will allow travel procurement executives to improve cost control efforts, create process efficiencies, drive compliance with managed travel programs and deliver greater results and return on investment.
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L'Avion Adding Second NYC-Paris Flight This Winter
France's L’Avion all business class airline says it will expedite growth plans in light of the fact that performance for its first six months of operations has exceeded projections. Starting within the 2007/2008 winter season, L’AVION will offer a second flight from New York to Paris leaving from Newark Liberty Airport and Orly Sud.
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La Quinta Adds 30 Hotels In First Six Months Of ’07
La Quinta Inns and Suites has opened 30 hotels to date in 2007. The chain is on track to open 90 hotels by year’s end through both corporate acquisition and franchising. Presently, there are more than 170 hotels in the franchise pipeline, 90 percent of which are new construction.
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Las Vegas OKs Mixed-use Development With 6,000-room Hotel
The Las Vegas City Council has approved plans for a $9.5 billion mixed-use development on the north end of the Las Vegas Strip, just north of the Stratosphere. The development, to be anchored by a 22,000 seat arena, is to be developed by REI, a real estate development company based in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. Plans also call for 300,000 square feet of gaming floor space, 6,000 hotel rooms, over 1.5 million square feet of commercial and retail floor space, 3.5 million square feet of office and permanent exhibition space, 1,500 condominiums and 1,600 timeshare units.
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Leading Hotels Signs With Smith Travel Research
The Leading Hotels of the World Ltd. has signed with Smith Travel Research to provide worldwide lodging industry metrics and property-level benchmarking reports. The mainstays of this initiative are The Bench’s global Hotel Benchmarking, and in North America, Smith Travel Research’s STAR program.
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Maxjet Joins 6 Major Airlines In Applying For China Service
Maxjet Airways, an all-business-class airline, has submitted an application to the Department of Transportation (DOT) to operate nonstop service between Shanghai and Seattle. Maxjet proposes to operate this service daily, starting March 25, 2009. The proposed service would be the first transpacific route for Maxjet, which flies transatlantic routes, including New York-London.
The DOT plans to award six routes that become available to China between 2007 and 2009. At least seven airlines have filed applications for the new routes:
* United Airlines has applied to launch nonstop service between San Francisco and Guangzhou in 2008. It proposes to launch Los Angeles-Shanghai service in 2009.
* US Airways has submitted a bid to launch Philadelphia-Beijing service in March 2009.
* Continental also proposes to launch China service in March 2009, between Newark and Shanghai.
* Northwest proposes to operate Detroit-Shanghai and Detroit-Beijing nonstop service.
* Delta, which had already applied to serve Atlanta-Shanghai, has expanded its application to include Atlanta-Beijing.
* American has already filed an application to serve a Chicago-Beijing route.
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Microtel Opens 15 Hotels In The First Half Of 2007
Microtel Inns & Suites, a chain of new-constructed, economy hotels, has opened 15 properties and broken ground on 10 others during the first half of 2007. New Microtel hotels are in Huntsville, Ala.; Wellton, Ariz.; Tulare, Calif.; Panama City, Fla.; Columbus, Conyers and Jasper, Ga.; Indianapolis; Colfax, Iowa; Hattiesburg, Miss.; Dover, N.H.; Middletown, N.Y.; Durant, Okla.; Grove City, Pa.; and Hazelton, West Va.
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Midwest To Launch Service To Charlotte And Austin
Midwest Airlines says it will launch new twice-daily service between Milwaukee and Charlotte, NC, and Kansas City and Austin, Texas, on September 15. The new service will be offered on Midwest Connect 50-seat regional jets. Additionally, Midwest will add a fourth nonstop roundtrip to its Milwaukee-Nashville schedule effective September 4, and a fourth nonstop roundtrip to its Milwaukee-Las Vegas schedule effective October 1.
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Names In The News 7/03/07
The Association of Corporate Travel Executives (ACTE) has named Jerome Drevon-Barreaux regional chair of ACTE Europe. Drevon-Barreaux is the global travel manager for Capgemini, a provider of consulting, technology and outsourcing services.
The Brown Palace Hotel & Spain Denver has appointed Mark Shine director of sales and marketing. Shine has worked with Quorum Hotels, which manages the Brown Palace, since 1996, beginning at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Tampa, where he led the conversion to an upscale, independent hotel, the Quorum Hotel-Tampa.
Crestline Hotels & Resorts has promoted Martin McHenry to director of sales and marketing for the Crowne Plaza in Fairfield, NJ. Prior to accepting this appointment, McHenry had served as director of rooms operations and director of group sales at the Hilton Parsippany in Parsippany, NJ, also a Crestline-managed property.
Vail Resorts has appointed Stan Brown executive vice president and chief operating officer of RockResorts and Vail Resorts Hospitality. Brown will oversee and direct the company’s entire lodging and hospitality division, and will start his new position on August 20. Since 2006, Brown has been Marriott International’s vice president of China, Malaysia, Vietnam, Korea and the Philippines.
The Wyndham Sugar Bay Resort & Spa in St. Thomas has named Laura Krueger senior group sales manager. Her responsibilities include increasing group sales from the Mid-Atlantic region for the newly renovated resort, which features a convention center that can accommodate up to 800 people. For the past five years, she has served as associate director of sales and marketing at the Westin Governor Morris in Morristown, NJ.
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Names In The News 7/16/07
Advito, the independent consulting division of BCD Travel, has named George Odom, senior director of its global business development team. Prior to joining Advito, Odom spent over 16 years as department head of travel services for Eli Lilly, where he was instrumental in developing and implementing strategic sourcing strategy for the company’s travel and meetings program. Regarded as an industry pioneer in meetings consolidation, Odom has also held positions in meeting planning, symposia coordination, sales training, and new product licensing. He will report directly to Mark Williams, vice president of global business development.
Hilton Atlanta Airport has promoted Paul Berman to director of business development from director of sales and marketing. Berman will be succeeded in that post by Michael Munroe, who most recently was director of sales and marketing at the Hilton University of Florida Conference Center in Gainesville. Berman's new responsibilities will include planning and leading activities relating to the development and expansion of all business segments for the 504-room airport property. In addition, he will be responsible for all areas of sales, revenue management as well as reservations, marketing, event services, catering and business travel.
Hilton Hotels Corporation has named Kelly Knowlen to director of sales for the Hilton at the Walt Disney World Resort, and Laurence Richardson, director of sales and marketing for the Doubletree at the Walt Disney World® Resort. Both positions are effective immediately.
NYLO Hotels has appointed Elaine Gamer as director of sales and marketing for its inaugural property, situated in the heart of Plano, Texas's thriving Legacy community. Gamer most recently served as the director of sales for W Dallas – Victory.
The Delafield Hotel in Delafield, Wis., has appointed Susan Kainz director of sales and marketing. Kainz was previously with Interstate Hotels & Resorts and Marcus Hotels & Resorts. Most recently she was with Marcus Hotels & Resort’s Grand Geneva Resort & Spa.
US Bank has named Chad Wilkins to the role of fueling business manager for its corporate payment systems. Wilkins will focus on growing the bank's fueling-related business, while ensuring execution on product and service commitments of existing client relationships. Over the past five years, US Bank has purchased several specialists in fuel-related services in the automotive and aviation industries, such as Voyager Fleet Systems, Multi Service Aviation and Advent Business Systems.
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Names In The News 7/19/07
The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs has named Gibson Hazard business development manager. Most recently, Hazard worked for the Cheyenne Mountain Resort in Colorado Springs, holding the positions of conference business development manager and market intelligence manager.
Enterprise Rent-A-Car has announced that Greg Stubblefield, a longtime Enterprise executive, will become president of Vanguard Car Rental following the completion of Enterprise’s purchase of Vanguard. On March 30, Enterprise entered into a definitive agreement to purchase Vanguard, which operates the National and Alamo brands in North America. That transaction is expected to close on Aug. 1. Stubblefield currently serves as president of Enterprise’s operations in California and Hawaii.
Hyatt Hotels & Resorts has promoted Ty Helms to senior vice president of revenue, a newly created role. Helms will be responsible for all corporate revenue-generating departments within Hyatt’s North American operations. Most recently, Helms was senior vice president of sales for Hyatt Hotels Corp. Jack Horne, vice president of sales for Hyatt Hotels & Resorts, will handle the additional responsibilities for all Hyatt sales resources, the field sales teams, the worldwide sales team, business and leisure individual travel teams and international inbound business teams. He reports to Helms.
La Posada Hotel in Laredo, Texas, has named Gene Belmares director of sales and marketing. La Posada recently completed a $15 million makeover that combines the hotel’s historic Spanish influence and colonial architecture with floor-to-ceiling renovations. Belmares, a Laredo native, was division sales and marketing Manager for WestWind Homes, a homebuilder in South Texas.
The Omni Interlocken Resort & Spa in Broomfield, Colo., has promoted Sheila Cornelius to director of group sales. She is responsible for generating national accounts for group rooms and meetings. Cornelius joined the Omni Interlocken in 2002 as senior sales manager responsible for corporate accounts in Denver and the Western territory.
The Monterey County Convention & Visitors Bureau in California has appointed Bruce Skidmore director of sales. Skidmore joins the bureau from Marriott, where he served as area director of sales for several Marriott and Renaissance hotels.
Virgin Limited Edition, a collection of retreats owned by Virgin Group chairman Richard Branson, has named Katrina Gomez regional director of sales USA. Gomez’s role will focus primarily on generating increased demand for Necker Island, Kasbah Tamadot and Ulusaba Private Game Reserve as well as launching The Lodge, Verbier and driving inbound business from the US for The Roof Gardens, London. For the last six years, Gomez has been director of global group sales at Kempinski Hotels.
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Names In The News 7/27/07
Hogg Robinson Group (HRG) has appointed Lee DeVet as vice president, HRG Consulting in North America. He will be based in New York. DeVet brings more than 20 years of expertise to HRG, including specific corporate travel industry experience.
Management Alternatives, a business travel consulting firm headquartered in Norwalk, Conn., has announced that Harvey Skolnick has joined the organization. Skolnick was the executive director in charge of meeting and travel services for KPMG LLP.
The National Business Travel Association (NBTA) has elected Kevin Maguire, director of travel for the Expedition Development Company, as its new president and CEO. Michael Lyons, travel manager for HSBC was elected vice president. Both will serve two-year terms. Also elected: directors-at-large representing Direct members for the next three years -- Charles Franklin, manager of corporate services at American Honda Motor Company, and Flodine Lee, corporate travel manager at JELD-WEN; director-at-large representing travel suppliers for the next two years -- Sean McCurdy, global director of worldwide sales at Interstate Hotels & Resorts.
The NBTA has added three new positions to its staff. Megan Lenfant is regional manager of European operations; Lynn Tovsen is government travel group manager; and Jorge Caamano is business travel analyst. Lenfant was regional manager for the Association of Corporate Travel Executives in Europe. Lenfant, who is based in Paris, will develop opportunities for NBTA to deliver content to the business travel community in Europe. Tovsen served as chief of the travel management division for the Department of Commerce. Tovsen will oversee NBTA's Government Travel Group, a membership category for government travel managers. Caamano most recently restructured the corporate travel and events department at Beazer Homes, a nationwide home builder headquartered in Atlanta. As a business travel analyst, Caamano will develop research and analysis on travel management best practices and trends.
PRA Destination Management Arizona has promoted Angela Hofford to director of sales and marketing. She was formerly national sales manager.
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NBTA Convention Registration Passes 4,000 Mark
Registration for the National Business Travel Association (NBTA) convention this month in Boston has passed the 4,000 mark — more than 1,225 of them corporate travel managers. The Association says it expected final registration numbers to be close to 6,000 from 30 countries. Among the highlights of the convention: more than 40 educational seminars, pre-convention programs in professional development and a full roster of high profile speakers, including General Colin L. Powell, USA (Ret.) and Gordon Bethune, Chair of Aloha Airgroup & Former CEO of Continental Airlines.
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NBTA Forms Regional Organization In Mexico
The National Business Travel Association has launched a regional organization in Mexico. According to the association, NBTA-Mexico will be the only organization in the country focused exclusively on business travel. Like NBTA’s other regional organizations, NBTA-Mexico will be a buyer-led organization, and the group’s direction will be determined by a board made up of Mexican corporate travel professionals and representatives of the NBTA parent organization.
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NBTA Foundation Upgrades Benchmarking Tool
The NBTA Foundation, the education and research foundation of the National Business Travel Association, has unveiled upgrades to its Managed Travel Index (MTI) & Benchmarking Tool. The upgrades allow users to benchmark their average air fares in their top 10 markets against those of peers and assess the maturity level of their corporate travel risk management programs in order to determine where added resources should be applied.
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NBTA Passes 3,000-member Mark
The National Business Travel Association (NBTA) says it has passed the 3,000-member mark for the first time in its nearly 40-year history. NBTA membership represents 30 nations, and includes almost 1,800 buyers of corporate and government travel services.
NBTA credits a number of factors for the growth, including added subsidiaries in Canada and the Asia-Pacific plus a third representing government travel buyers; and establishment of a committee on Groups & Meetings, which has attracted more members with corporate meetings responsibilities.
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North American To Start Baltimore-Nigeria Service
North American Airlines will launch three weekly flights linking Baltimore and Lagos, Nigeria, on Sept. 4. The service will operate with one stop at New York's JFK Airport. North American also serves Baltimore with weekly service to and from Accra, Ghana.
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Orbitz Adds Las Vegas Monorail To Inventory
Orbitz Worldwide will offer booking for the Las Vegas Monorail Company through its Activities path, as stand alone purchases or as add-ons for customers booking customized packages to Las Vegas. The Monorail service is a seven-stop elevated train system that covers four miles of Las Vegas casinos and attractions, including a direct connection to eight resorts and the Las Vegas Convention Center. Its future expansion plans include direct access to McCarran International Airport.
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Orbitz Prices $510 Million IPO
Orbitz Worldwide has priced its initial public offering of 34 million shares of common stock at $15 per share. The common stock will trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol OWW.
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Orbitz Unveils Booking Site For Managing Small Businesses' Travel
Orbitz for Business has launched a self-managed booking site for small businesses. The new offering includes features and benefits of Orbitz's larger managed programs, including access to corporate travel rates at no cost beyond the transaction fees. The self-managed site also offers reporting, including monthly executive travel summaries documenting all travel categories; unused e-ticket tracking; free online exchanges, cancellations and voids (airline-imposed fees may still apply); and a dedicated customer service line.
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Orbitz, Win Group Partner To Offer Meeting Services
Orbitz for Business and Travelport for Business have integrated "meeting planning" tabs on their corporate travel sites that will send clients’ meetings planning requirements directly to The Win Group meeting planning consultancy and its staff of meetings professionals. The Orbitz Worldwide sites will handle the travel arrangements and Win Group will help customers plan their off-site meetings or corporate events.
Win Group services for Orbitz customers will cover meeting program design; site selection and contract negotiation; program budget development and management; meeting planning and coordination; web registration; ground transportation; food and beverage coordination; sightseeing and off-site functions; speakers, entertainment and décor; on-site program management; awards, promotions, amenities; A/V and production coordination; and meetings consolidation consulting/training.
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Passkey Launches Alert System For Meeting Planners
Passkey, a provider of online group reservations, has launched Smart Alerts, a system that automatically delivers event information via e-mail to Passkey users at critical event milestones. Alerts are sent out automatically as soon as certain user-specified event conditions are met, such as whenever an event hotel block is at least 85 percent full. Passkey users can configure an unlimited number of alerts for each event and provide an unlimited number of alert recipients.
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Portaga Nabs American As A Client
Portaga has announced that American Airlines has signed a letter of intent to utilize Portaga’s Internet-based travel management technology. According to Charlie Sultan, American’s managing director of sales planning and analysis, the airlines plans to leverage Portaga's user interface to allow customers to interact with American Airlines through a variety of different access points.
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Private Label Adds Okura
The Private Label Company, a joint venture between the Leading Hotels of the World and Trust International, has added Okura Hotels & Resorts to its customer portfolio. Private Label provides reservations and distribution technology, global sales support, voice reservations services and management consultation to hotels. It provides these services on an a la carte basis or bundled together.
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Qantas Unveils A380 Interior, Plans To Expand In US
Qantas has revealed the interior and seating to be installed onboard its fleet of 20 Airbus A380 super jumbo jets, which are scheduled for delivery from August 2008. The aircraft will be configured with 450 seats -- 14 in first, 72 in business, 32 in its new premium economy cabin and 332 in economy. In the business cabin, Qantas has enhanced its Skybed sleeper seat, which will offer a longer, fully flat bed with ergonomically enhanced cushioning, a larger in-arm entertainment screen and additional storage. The business cabin will have a private lounge area on the upper deck of the aircraft featuring leather sofas, a self-service bar and a large video monitor with laptop connectivity. The new economy seat will feature a sliding base that moves with the seat back to create a "more comfortable, ergonomically correct position to aid sleep and eliminate pressure points." The economy cabin also will offer four self-service bars, enabling people to help themselves to refreshments throughout the flight in addition to the normal meal services.
Also, as part of an overall international flight schedule expansion to meet rising demand, Qantas will increase its US services to Australia in March 2008. There will be two additional weekly nonstops between Los Angeles and Brisbane. Qantas will also increase its services between Los Angeles and Sydney, resulting in a total of 17 weekly services.
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Qatar Launches US Service, Signs Codeshare With United
Qatar Airways has launched its nonstop service between Doha, Qatar and Newark. The airline operates four flights per week between the destinations. Qatar Airways is set to launch daily service between Doha and Washington Dulles on July 19.
Also, Qatar Airways and United Airlines are filing a joint application with the US Department of Transportation, seeking permission to place their codes on each other’s flights. As part of the agreement, Qatar Airways would apply its flight code on flights operated by United Airlines from Washington to more than 50 cities across the U.S., and flights operated by United from London Heathrow, Paris, Frankfurt, Zurich, Rome and Munich to one or all of the following cities: Los Angeles, San Francisco, Washington and Chicago.
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Radisson To Take Over Mall Of America Hotel
Radisson To Take Over Mall Of America Hotel
Radisson Hotels has signed an agreement to rebrand the Grand Lodge at Minneapolis’ Mall of America to Radisson by September. The Grand Lodge opened in May 2006.
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Radius, Travelocity Business To Offer NBTA Benchmarking Tool
Radius and Travelocity Business have formed a partnership with the NBTA Foundation, enabling them to offer their corporate clients access to the NBTA Foundation’s Managed Travel Index (MTI) & Benchmarking Tool. The agreement with Radius enables its members to sign clients up for the MTI & Benchmarking Tool. Travelocity Business has arranged to offer the tool to its corporate client base.
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Rearden Adds Flight-delay Alerts To Personal Assistant Service
Rearden Commerce says it now provides real-time flight updates to business travelers who book air travel through its platform, enhancing its online personal assistant service. The flight data comes from multiple sources (FAA, GDS, airlines, and weather services) and instantly alerts business travelers to flight delays, gate changes and cancellations. In the event of a gate change or departure delay, Rearden Commerce pushes this information to the traveler via their device of choice, as early as 24 hours prior to flight departure.
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Rearden Chooses CyberShift To Provide Expense Tool
CyberShift, a provider of global workforce-management and expense-management software, partnered with Rearden Commerce. Under the terms of the agreement, CyberShift and Rearden will deliver an integrated, web-based, booking and expense-reporting solution for mid-sized to large enterprises.
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Rearden Commerce Adds Expense Management Capability
Rearden Commerce, which provides an online suite of tools for travel management, has partnered with expense-management providers to introduce its Open Expense Network. The network leverages Rearden Commerce’s open platform, enabling corporate customers to integrate Rearden Commerce with any expense management tool of their choosing without being locked into a proprietary solution.
Rearden says the network enables organizations to manage multiple categories of spending, including traditional travel expenses (air, car and hotel) and other business expenses such as dining, airport parking, car service and package shipping.
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Red Lion Hotels De-fat Restaurant Menus
Red Lion Hotels Corporation has announced that all menu items at its participating restaurants, lounges and banquet facilities have been converted to zero trans fat selections. All participating Red Lion restaurants and lounges are clearly displaying the brand’s new trans fat-free logo. The brand’s website also identifies these restaurants and lounges.
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Ritz-Carlton Set To Open Dallas Hotel
The Ritz-Carlton, Dallas is scheduled to open on Aug. 15. It will be Ritz-Carlton’s first US hotel to open in four years. The 218-room Ritz-Carlton is set in a new, 21-story building on McKinney Avenue, a shopping, dining and entertainment enclave in Uptown Dallas. The Ritz-Carlton will feature Fearing’s Restaurant, created by celebrity chef Dean Fearing, a master of Southwest cuisine. Seventy Ritz-Carlton residences also occupy the block-wide complex.
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Sabre Introduces Travel Locator
Sabre Travel Network has launched its Traveler Security and Data Suite, which enables corporate travel managers and travel agencies to locate travelers worldwide. The Traveler Security and Data Suite is available 24/7 via secured access. Users can drill down from a world map to a list of travelers with detail or use specific criteria to target the search. The detailed report includes traveler contact information and complete Sabre reservation data.
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Shangri-La To Develop Hotel In Vienna's Historic District
Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts has signed a long-term lease agreement for the former Erste Bank headquarters, which will open in late 2009 as the 207-room Shangri-La Hotel, Vienna.
The site comprises four historic buildings in a city block with excellent views, situated directly on the grand 19th century boulevard Ringstrasse with its characteristic historical and art nouveau architecture and the green oasis of Beethovenplatz. It is located within walking distance of upscale shopping, fine dining and national attractions such as the Konzerthaus (Concert House), Musikverein, Oper (Opera), Belvedere Palace and St. Stephan’s Cathedral. The Vienna International Airport is easily accessed via the nearby airport express train or is less than half an hour by car.
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SkyTeam Carriers Launch Corporate Booking Tool
Continental, Delta and Northwest, partners in the SkyTeam airline alliance, have collaborated to launch SkyCorp Direct, an online booking tool for "companies of all sizes." SkyCorp Direct provides access to airline, hotel and car rental content. Travel managers can customize SkyCorp Direct based on their company’s travel policies. Employees can create individual travel profiles, including credit card information, loyalty program account numbers, seat preferences and preferred vendors. In addition, customers will receive bonus miles for each booking on Continental, Delta and Northwest Airlines. Customers wishing to fly on airlines other than Continental, Delta and Northwest will be charged a $5 booking fee. Bookings on Delta, Continental and Northwest are free.
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Southwest To Slow Growth, Implement New Flight Boarding Method
Southwest Airlines has decided to slow capacity growth in the fourth quarter of 2007 and all of 2008. It will grow its fleet in 2008 by 19 net aircraft, 15 fewer than was previously reported. Southwest will eliminate certain transcontinental routes, such as Baltimore-Los Angeles and Cleveland-Phoenix, and add flights in key growth market cities such as Denver and New Orleans.
CEO Gary Kelly says slowing capacity growth would allow the carrier time to implement and evaluate the effectiveness of several initiatives Southwest intends to launch in the fourth quarter of 2007, including a new boarding/seating method, an enhancement of its frequent-flyer program and a new advertising campaign. "Given the slowing US economy and fuel cost pressures, we are taking these steps to adjust our capacity growth rate, which will help to restore profit growth," Kelly said. "In this economic environment, we simply need to take less risk and grow more slowly."
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St. Maarten Establishes Tax Rebate For Conventions
St. Maarten Establishes Tax Rebate For Conventions
The Caribbean island of St. Maarten has implemented the Tax Information Exchange Agreement with the U.S., which allows US taxpayers to claim a tax deduction for the expenses associated with a convention held on the Dutch half of the island to the same extent as a convention held in the US. Expenses for St. Maarten events such as meetings, conventions, seminars and exhibits are now 100 percent tax deductible.
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St. Maarten Makes Meetings 100% Tax Deductible
The island of St. Maarten/St. Martin, located approximately 150 miles southeast of Puerto Rico, has implemented the "Tax Information Exchange Agreement" with the United States. This tax initiative allows U.S. taxpayers to claim a tax deduction for the expenses associated with a convention held on the Dutch half of the island to the same extent as a convention held in the US. This means many of the expenses incurred through international travel to events such as meetings, conventions, seminars and exhibits that are held in Dutch St. Maarten are now 100 percent tax deductible.
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StarCite Introduces Centralized RFP Solution
StarCite, a technology provider for corporate meetings and events, has launched its Group Lead Center, which allows hotels and event suppliers to manage all incoming electronic requests for proposals in a single, centralized online location. Traditionally, the sales process for corporate meetings is inconsistent and labor-intensive, requiring suppliers to filter through faxes, e-mails and phone calls to review and manage incoming leads, says StarCite, adding that online sourcing significantly streamlines this process.
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StarCite Plans Integration With Orbitz
StarCite has formed an alliance with Orbitz Worldwide’s Corporate Travel Solutions Group. StarCite users and meeting attendees will be able to book travel on Orbitz for Business and Travelport for Business directly from StarCite’s Attendee Management application. The new travel booking feature is expected to be available to customers by the first quarter of 2008.
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Starwood Adds Montreal Site To Growing Aloft Portfolio
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide continues the rollout of its aloft brand franchises with the groundbreaking of its first aloft hotel in Canada, aloft Montreal Airport. The first aloft hotels are targeted to open in 2008 and this will be among those first to come online. Aloft Montreal Airport will offer business and leisure travelers easy access to downtown Montreal and its nearby local attractions.
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Starwood Unveils Latin America Expansion Plan
Starwood Hotels & Resorts is working on 12 hotel projects throughout Latin America. Projects include the W Santiago in Chile, the first W in South America, and the first Westin in Mexico City. Both are scheduled to open in 2008. Westin is also opening its first hotel in Honduras in 2008. St. Regis is adding three hotels in the region, in Costa Rica, Mexico City and Punta Mita, Mexico. Le Meridien (Cancun), Sheraton (Argentina and Panama) and Four Points by Sheraton (Argentina and Panama) are also adding properties in Latin America.
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Steigenberger Joins Pegasus, Utell Networks
Steigenberger Hotel Group will add its hotel and meeting space inventory to Pegasus Solutions' RezView CRS and distribution technology and use Utell Hotels and Resorts' representation and marketing services. Headquartered in Frankfurt/Main, the hotel company has 82 properties in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, the Netherlands and Egypt. Fifty-four operate under the flag of the Steigenberger Hotels and Resorts brand; 28, under the InterCity brand.
In addition, the RezView next generation capabilities, recently introduced by Pegasus as RezViewNG, will provide even greater levels of flexibility and control by integrating CRS, Web functionality and guest recognition capabilities. A highly scalable and flexible technology platform capable of supporting many different distribution strategies, RezViewNG will allow Steigenberger hotels timely extraction of data for reporting and easy access via a browser-based user interface that serves as a flexible, single entry point.
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Succor Group Offers Help Desk Services For Travelers
Succor Group has e-travel training and consulting service for government agencies and US corporations. One of Succor Group's specialties is the management of e-travel Help Desks, whether establishing, staffing and supporting a new Help Desk, or redesigning and/or assuming the responsibility of an existing Help Desk. It also offers training and support for users of travel charge cards, travel vouchers, expense reporting, and reconciliation of centrally billed charge cards in DTS and eTS.
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TAM To Buy 22 Airbus Widebodies
Brazilian carrier TAM Airlines has signed a memorandum of understanding to acquire 22 Airbus A350 XWB (Xtra Wide Body) aircraft, to be delivered between 2013 and 2018. The company will be the first in Latin America to have these new aircraft in its long-haul fleet. TAM has confirmed it is also exercising four more A330 options, which will be delivered by the manufacturer in 2010 (two planes) and 2011 (two planes). According to the price list, the total value of TAM’s aircraft order is around $5.4 billion.
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TravelSavers Network Adds Agencies In India, Chicago
The TravelSavers Worldwide Independent Network (TWIN) has Sahara Global, based in India, and Chicago's Apollo Travel to its international networking organization.
Sahara Global provides services in business travel, inbound, outbound, meetings and conventions, and medical tourism. Its agencies are located in: Gurgaon, Hyderabad, Chennai, Kolkata, Mumbai, Pune and Bangalore. Apollo primarily serves the corporate arena but also offers a leisure product.
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Tri-Pen Fields Pilot Of TravelMaster Software-as-service Model
Tri-Pen Management is beginning a pilot program of its new software-as-service model, called the Enterprise Version, of its proprietary TravelMaster technology. W.R. Grace is among the first to sign up for the pilot.
The original version of TravelMaster was designed for corporations to purchase and install in their own environment behind their own firewalls. The new Enterprise Version allows travel managers "to quickly implement the technology and benefit from its advantages," explains Joe Monaghan, senior vice president of global business development at Tri-Pen TravelMaster Technologies. The TravelMaster platform leverages push technology and dynamic dashboards configurable down to the end-user level, where it is configurable to how users work.
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TRX Integrates Auto-ticketing And Reporting Tools With Booking Engine
TRX customers who use the RESX corporate self-booking tool will be able to automatically ticket flight reservations with Correx, the company’s reservations-processing solution. Correx automates quality control, file finishing, ticketing and other mid-office activities normally handled manually by travel agents. All RESX-accredited agencies will be able to initiate auto-ticketing regardless of whether they are an existing Correx client.
TRX is launching a pilot of the RESX auto-ticketing functionality this week and plans to extend the offering across its client base within 90 days.
TRX is also incorporating the data reporting functionality of its TravelTrax application into the RESX corporate self-booking tool.
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TRX Supplies Reporting Tool For Orbitz Worldwide, Integrates Park ’N Fly
Orbitz Worldwide has signed a data reporting contract with TRX. The agreement will allow both Orbitz for Business and Travelport for Business to provide corporate customers with TRX’s TravelTrax reporting tool.
TRX also has integrated Park ’N Fly Network inventory into its corporate online booking tool. Business travelers using the RESX tool are able to add parking reservations to their itineraries during the booking process.
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TRX Unveils New Reporting Tool
TRX has released its newest travel data reporting application, TravelTrax Standard v1.0, a web-based, on-demand reporting platform designed for corporations of all sizes. TravelTrax Standard has dashboard reporting, identifies available discounts for the company based on current travel spend, highlights advantages gained by consolidating air spend from several suppliers, analyzes the travel policies travelers are following and illustrates the financial impact of tightened or loosened travel policies.
The platform has three levels: standard, professional, and enterprise. TravelTrax Professional includes the standard features, plus advanced capabilities to support more complex data integration, customization, personalized dashboard visualization for divisional or account-specific reporting, and business intelligence requirements. TravelTrax Enterprise is available to travel agencies, airlines and financial institutions to sell on a private-label basis to their corporate accounts.
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Unisys Opens Registered Traveler Service At Reno-Tahoe
Unisys Corp.’s Registered Traveler program, rtGO, is now open at Reno-Tahoe International Airport in Reno, Nev. Registration began in May, and members have begun receiving their rtGO cards, which they will use at specially designated security lanes to verify their identity.
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United Refinances Debt
United Airlines has refinanced nearly $1 billion in existing lease and mortgage debt through the issuance of $694 million in Enhanced Equipment Trust Certificates and $270 million in Special Facility Revenue Refunding Bonds at Denver International Airport. The proceeds from these debt offerings will refinance existing aircraft lease and mortgage debt associated with 13 widebody aircraft and the existing Special Facility Revenue Bonds at the airport. The transactions are expected to save United approximately $10 million in interest and rent expense for the remainder of 2007 and $22 million for all of 2008.
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Virgin America Begins Selling Tickets Today
Virgin America begins selling tickets today through Travelport’s aiRES™, a next-generation passenger services system. In a separate deal, Galileo, a Travelport brand, has signed a multiple-year full content agreement with the new airline, making Galileo the exclusive GDS to offer the carrier’s tickets for sale at launch time. The carrier will start flights in August.
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World Travel Inc. Joins Radius
World Travel Inc., a travel agency based in Douglassville, Pa., has joined the Radius network of travel management companies. World Travel Inc. turns over $450 million in annual sales.
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WorldHotels Launches Automated Rate-loading
WorldHotels, a group for independent hotels and regional brands, has launched an automated rate-loading process for corporate clients. The technology, which is possible through a seamless interface between Nexus (WorldHotels’ account management and contracting platform) and WorldHotels’ CRS provider, ensures that negotiated rates are quickly loaded into GDSs upon acceptance from the client, that rates are loaded with total contract compliance and that they remain accessible throughout the term of the contract.
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WorldMate Service Free To Nokia S60 Users
WorldMate, a travel service for mobile devices, is now free for Nokia S60 smartphone users. Basic travel services include world clocks, weather forecasts and currency conversion. Specific premium services such as comprehensive flight schedules and real-time flight status require a paid subscription.
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Worldspan Shows US Helicopter To Global Market
Worldspan and US Helicopter have reached a new multi-year agreement under which the shuttle service will use Worldspan's global marketing and distribution services, as well as its e-ticketing and interline e-ticketing (IET) services.
Also as part of the agreement, US Helicopter will upgrade its participation to Worldspan Airline Source(R) for optimum GDS connectivity and performance.
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Worldspan Unveils Car Rental Selling Tool, Rail Booking Tool
Worldspan has introduced a car rental marketing tool, Worldspan Car Upsell, which gives car rental companies the ability to display higher-class vehicle options to Worldspan-wired travel agents during the booking process. Dollar and Thrifty are the first companies to introduce Car UpSell options 0through Worldspan. Car UpSell alerts a travel agent during the booking process when a higher-class vehicle is available from the same car rental company. Car UpSell automatically calculates the cost of the upgrade and gives the travel agent the ability to book the reservation with a single click.
Worldspan has also introduced a rail booking tool on its Worldspan Go Web platform. It is available free of charge to Worldspan agents, who can shop and book the commissionable products of North American, European and Japanese rail service providers. The tool features graphical displays, point-and-click navigation, mouse-over functionality, pull-down menus, interactive calendars and a route-mapping tool.
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