Tag Archives: NDC

Amadeus signed technology partnership agreement with Safe Travel & Services, one of leading travel agencies in UAE. The travel company provides comprehensive range of services for individual travelers, corporate clients, and groups from and to the UAE, including customized packages and visa services. Under the agreement, Safe Travel & Services and its customers will benefit from various Amadeus products and solutions. These include Amadeus Online Suite, an omni -channel e-commerce solution to expand online presence and deliver a wealth of quality tailored content; Business Management Platform, incorporating various solutions such as robotic ticketing tools and sales data management systems to support pricing, analysis, and ticketing automation through a single platform. Also included in portfolio is Amadeus All Fares Plus, which helps agents find best air deals by comparing multiple content sources, including NDC-enabled content, and Amadeus B2B Wallet to offer payment options. Ernesto Sanchez Beaumont, Managing Director, Amadeus Gulf, said: “With travel gaining momentum as more countries open their doors to travelers, we are committed to supporting Safe Travel & Services in rapidly finding the best air deals for its customers and providing a seamless end-to-end travel payments solution offering greater choice, reach, and orchestration.” Raed Baidas, General Manager of Safe Travel & Services, said: “To address challenges of the modern tourism industry, we know that planning, developing, and adapting to evolving needs of the market is key to our success. Adopting Amadeus’ latest technology solutions will help us realise our ambitions and position us strategically as we strengthen our customer relationships and take our value-offering to the next level.” As the travel ecosystem evolves, the industry is ready to upgrade and enhance systems and processes and have in place …

Sabre Corporation has successfully integrated IATA New Distribution Capability (NDC) content from Qatar Airways (QR) to its global distribution system (GDS). After a pilot phase with agency customers in Australia and Sweden, the offers of Qatar’s flag carrier will now be rolled out successively to travel agencies across the globe starting on July 7, 2022. Travel agencies will be able to shop, book, and manage NDC offers from Qatar Airways. Access to Qatar’s content will be available through Sabre Red 360, Sabre’s agency point-of-sale tool, as well as its NDC-enabled Offer and Order Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). “We’ve been actively engaged in Sabre’s Beyond NDC program for several years and we’re proud to be the first carrier based in EMEA to make our products and offers available to the global travel agency community through Sabre’s marketplace,” said Matt Raos, Senior Vice President Global Sales at Qatar Airways. “With NDC as a part of our strategy to evolve our offering and enhance ancillary sales, we believe effective distribution in the indirect channel will become more important in the future.” With Qatar Airways’ extensive network of destinations, access to the carrier’s unique NDC content is expected to be relevant to travel buyers across the globe in the post-COVID-19 recovery period and beyond. “As the corporate travel sector continues to recover, customers are looking for enhanced shopping experiences and improved content in their marketplace,” said John Bukowski, Vice President of Distribution, Content and Sourcing at American Express Global Business Travel. “Our objective is to ensure that our customers and travelers have access to the broadest content and an unrivaled travel experience. We are excited about collaborating with Qatar Airways and Sabre to continue …

Travelport introduced its enhanced RESTful / JSON APIs that will provide next-generation retailing and exchange capabilities to travel retailers worldwide. As part of Travelport’s investment in its next-generation platform, Travelport+, the new APIs are being rolled out globally and will offer retailers a gateway to better content choices, the tools to tailor their retailing experience, and the power to greatly improve the efficiency of their operations. “With our new APIs, we’ve expanded our modern retailing toolkit so that agencies upgrading to Travelport+ can more easily personalize the retailing experience they provide to their customers,” said Greg Webb, Chief Executive Officer at Travelport. “The improvements we’ve made with these enhanced RESTful / JSON APIs will give travel retailers around the world simplified access to dynamic retail-ready content, from multiple sources, across all of their points of sale. And to ensure agencies can effectively operate as modern digital retailers, our APIs will also deliver the tools to optimize storefronts, better engage customers and manage trips more efficiently.” The modern, lightweight and highly functional APIs, which can also be used in conjunction with Travelport’s SOAP / XML APIs, drive up to 68% faster average transactions and a faster shopping and booking experience for travelers. The JSON API also enables greater flexibility and speed for developers, fostering quick, seamless connections and an optimized experience for both developers and travel retailers. Travelport’s new APIs include all of the details needed for public, private and tour operator specific air content and can be deeply enriched with Travelport’s branded fares. Additional API capabilities include streamed, cached content, speeding up the delivery of marketplace pricing and giving retailers the ability to inspire customers with highly relevant travel offers. …

Sharaf Travel Services and Amadeus have set a new milestone to drive forward New Distribution Capability (NDC). Together with Sharaf Travels, Amadeus has successfully issued a Singapore airlines ticket on 4th March 2021 with NDC content via Amadeus Travel Platform. Sharaf Travel has thus laid the foundation to deliver modern retailing, with new, richer and more innovative content and advanced servicing for its travelers. NDC is an integral part of the Amadeus Travel Platform which brings together travel content from multiple sources (EDIFACT, NDC and other APIs), allowing travel agencies to easily search and compare offers on one screen. Through Amadeus’ NDC-enabled solutions, travel agencies like Sharaf Travel are able to shop, order and pay for airline travel offers via NDC in their usual booking environment. Additionally, Sharaf Travel has access to the main servicing capabilities that an agency requires once a booking via NDC has been made, such as changes, cancellations, or adding ancillary services such as preferred seats, meals or checked baggage. Jayaram Vaidyanathan Iyer, Managing Director, Sharaf Travels, said, “Our travel business was established to provide quality travel and tour services to the rapidly expanding population in the UAE. To meet that aim, we firmly believe in the value of NDC to address the industry’s need for modern retailing as well as travelers’ changing needs, offering our customers access to rich content as well as a transparent shopping experience.” “We are thrilled to have processed our first booking via NDC in the UAE with Sharaf Travel. As we roll-out our NDC-enabled solutions and make content via NDC available, we are opening up a world of opportunities for agencies and travelers in the region,” said Ernesto Sanchez Beaumont, Managing …

Seera Group has extended its long-standing partnership with Amadeus to adopt NDC. As the Middle East’s leading provider of travel and tourism services, Seera Group will join Amadeus’ NDC [X] program and implement the NDC-enabled Travel API solution to distribute richer airline products to its customers. It will allow the selling of new fares and services to customers that are only available via NDC. Customers are at the core of everything the Seera Group does, and integrating NDC efficiently within its workflow, online and offline, will help the group’s travel brands differentiate its offers with more relevant options, better fares and availability, as well as post-booking servicing capabilities. Speaking about the extension, Tarique Khatri, EVP at Seera Group, said, “Amadeus has been a long-term technology partner of Seera. We have been working together successfully to drive innovation in the region and provide our customers access to new, dynamic airline content that includes more tailored services. Amadeus has always been at the forefront of cutting-edge technology for our industry, and working together to implement NDC was a natural extension of this partnership. We are confident that NDC will help us personalize our offer, open up new opportunities to upsell, and really elevate our customer experience.” Bernhard Steffens, Senior Vice President of Business Travel Agencies in Europe, Middle East and Africa said, “For a brand like Seera Group that focuses on customer centricity, the adoption of NDC makes perfect sense. It will help add tremendous value to its travelers, and cement Seera’s place at the forefront of travel innovation in the Middle East. With NDC taking off in the industry, Seera Group understood it was the opportune time to partner with us …

Lufthansa Group airlines and Sabre Corporation announced a new, mutually flexible distribution agreement that enables modern airline retailing as well as technology innovation. Under the agreement, which covers the carriers Austrian Airlines, Lufthansa, SWISS, Air Dolomiti and Brussels Airlines, Sabre will continue to distribute Lufthansa Group airlines’ content through traditional connectivity to hundreds of thousands of travel agents and thousands of corporations through its global distribution system (GDS). In addition, the agreement enables the distribution of Lufthansa Group airlines’ content via the New Distribution Capability (NDC) standard in the Sabre travel marketplace. “Our agreement with Sabre is a landmark deal for airline distribution. I am very excited to shape our joint path towards modern airline retailing and innovate by introducing a diversified NDC program with associated commercial models, – enabling agencies to agree bilaterally on NDC with Lufthansa Group airlines”, says Tamur Goudarzi Pour, Senior Vice President Revenue Management and Distribution Lufthansa Group Network Airlines and Chief Commercial Officer SWISS. “Sabre and Lufthansa Group airlines share an ambition to innovate at the forefront of our industry. Through this new level of flexibility, we jointly enable a diverse distribution ecosystem, extend the reach of NDC and allow for differentiated commercial models. With this customer-oriented agreement, Sabre and the Lufthansa Group airlines team up to put the interests of our travel agency partners and our joint clients at center stage.” “Today maybe more than ever, we are looking to engage creatively with our airline and agency partners to deliver outcomes that provide added value to all players in the travel ecosystem,” says Dave Shirk, President, Sabre Travel Solutions. “Sabre is committed to finding flexible, sustainable solutions that address traveler expectations, deliver against …

Emirates has launched a suite of connectivity options for its trade partners around the world to easily and directly access the airline’s rich content and other services.Developed using IATA’s New Distribution Capability (NDC) standards, the Emirates Gateway is available via the recently launched Emirates Partners Portal. Adnan Kazim, Emirates’ Chief Commercial Officer said, “The Emirates Gateway suite of connection options has been built on new technology and is designed to address the limitations of current legacy distribution systems. Our aim was to create a platform that empowers us to rapidly develop and deploy new products and services, thereby giving us and our trade partners the ability to offer even more value-added and differentiated services. It also prepares the way for Emirates to offer custom content and dynamic pricing that better responds to our changing marketplace.” Offering improved access to Emirates’ products and services with an intuitive and easy to ease interface, the Emirates Gateway offers the airline’s trade partners the ability to enhance travellers’ journeys with customised products and services. Trade partners can connect to the Emirates Gateway via three flexible access solutions: Emirates Booking Portal: a user-friendly web booking portal available in 12 languages, connected directly to Emirates’ reservation systems that simplifies the booking, ticketing and post-ticketing servicing of Emirates orders; Emirates Gateway Direct: which provides access to Emirates content through IATA NDC APIs, allowing trade partners to build applications that meet their needs with expert support from Emirates’ IT teams; Emirates Gateway Sync: a facilitated link into the Emirates reservation system provided by industry leading, IATA registered, Emirates certified technology partners.

Etihad Airways has partnered with Travelfusion as it continues its New Distribution Capability (NDC) strategy launched earlier this year. The venture will provide access for travel agents and corporate clients to Etihad’s content and enhance the sales distribution of tickets and ancillaries. Travelfusion will make use of the airline’s International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) certified NDC platform to provide all relevant booking information such as cabin details, fare rules, baggage allowances, as well as access to book flights. Dieter Westermann, Vice President Revenue Management, Etihad Airways, said, “The adoption of NDC is a major milestone and partnering with Travelfusion gives us the ability to connect with new-age travel technology companies, as well as forge stronger relationships with travel agents and corporate clients. Connecting through Travelfusion benefits the travel trade and reduces the investment required to build an independent IT system.” Moshe Rafiah, CEO, Travelfusion, said, “Travelfusion has been a pioneer in NDC since the birth of the programme and we are very pleased with the opportunity to bring our experience to bear in working with Etihad Airways in this exciting new dimension in their distribution strategy.”

Amadeus and Seera Group have strengthened their partnership to drive technology innovation in the region’s tourism sector. This follows a year of successful partnership between the two leading entities that led to significant digital transformation of travel and tourism services offered by Seera Group and helped enhance its all-round business efficiency. With the renewed partnership, Seera Group works closely with Amadeus to strengthen its online business further, integrating digital touch-points across all its operations, including its flagship corporate and government travel business, elaa. As the travel tech provider across Seera’s diverse portfolio of services, Amadeus brings cutting-edge innovation and state-of-the-art tech tools that enhance customer service standards and bring higher operational efficiency across the Group. In other highlights of the successful partnership, Amadeus is supporting Seera Group in expanding its omni-channel consumer travel business, Almosafer, across Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and beyond, in addition to the ongoing digitisation of booking services for corporate and government travel via elaa. Amadeus has been an ongoing strategic partner of Seera Group and has provided a host of technical support that helped consolidate the Group’s online business through tools such as Touchless that scaled up its efficiency of operations. Seera will implement the latest Amadeus solutions relating to hotel content, virtual credit card payment capabilities, fare optimisation solutions and content via NDC (New Distribution Capability) connectivity. The Group will also implement new products by Amadeus to enhance operational efficiency.

Sabre Corporation is sponsoring the Travel Technology Theatre at the Arabian Travel Market (ATM 2019), from April 28 to May 1, 2019. Executive speakers from Sabre and guest customers will participate in the seminar programme and showcase latest technology in the travel and hospitality sector including NDC, emerging technology, retailing and digitalisation and discuss industry challenges and opportunities. Abdul-Razzaq Iyer, Vice President, Sabre Travel Network Middle East will be present at the event seminar and speak about the evolution of the travel industry in the Middle East and how can companies leverage new trends and technology to respond to customers’ expectations. “This is such an exciting time for the travel sector. The industry is evolving, constantly adapting to the increasing expectations of tech-travelers, which are higher and more diverse than ever before,” said Iyer. “The rise of new technologies and trends are creating more opportunities for all players in the travel industry and we are here to support our customers and the market to learn about everything new in travel and how to leverage these opportunities.” Sabre is also highlighting through its seminar programme the evolution of travel distribution and how NDC is changing the landscape of the industry. “Due to growing pressure from the industry, travel suppliers are increasingly differentiating their offerings – looking to retail and merchandise to travellers in new ways – to maximize their revenues. Sabre isn’t waiting for NDC adoption – we believe it is just one component of a wider shift in retailing and distribution in the travel industry, and we are this year developing exciting new technology that will help suppliers to tell their stories effectively through the indirect channel.” Iyer added.