Tag Archives: International Air Transport Association

Emirates will be hosting the International Air Transport Association (IATA) inaugural Global Accessibility Symposium, taking place in Dubai from November 5-6, 2019. The IATA Global Accessibility Symposium furthers the commitment of the resolution on passengers with disabilities which was made at the IATA Annual General Meeting in Seoul in June 2019. The resolution aims to improve the air travel experience for the estimated one billion people living with disabilities worldwide by encouraging governments, airlines, airports, and stakeholders across the aviation industry to work together to ensure access to a safe, reliable and dignified travel experience. The invitation-only event will include keynotes, panel discussions and fireside chats that will tackle a wide variety of accessibility topics. Sir Tim Clark, President of Emirates Airline said, “Emirates employs every effort to make air travel as comfortable and as seamless as possible for our customers, especially for those with special needs and disabilities. It is apt for the first IATA symposium on this important issue to be held in Dubai, as it’s the city’s aim to become one of the world’s most accessible cities for People of Determination and Emirates is proud to play a role to help advance this dialogue.” Alexandre de Juniac, Director General and CEO of IATA said, “The unanimous resolution by our airline members in June was a clear indication that the industry is committed to improving the air travel experience for passengers with disabilities. The Global Accessibility Symposium marks a renewed and stronger dialogue between industry, advocacy groups, regulators and the travellers themselves.” As the host city of the first IATA Global Accessibility Symposium and the hub for Emirates Airline, Dubai is moving forward with its mission in becoming …

Travelport has reached a full content agreement with Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) under which the former will expand availability of PIA’s content to Travelport-connected agencies in the Americas and Asia Pacific, as well as continue to provide access across Europe, the Middle East and Africa. In doing so, over 68,000 agencies globally servicing hundreds of millions of travellers will now have real-time access to search, sell, and book the airlines’ full content and inventory. As the first global distribution system (GDS) to manage the live booking of flights using the International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) New Distribution Capability (NDC) technical standard, Travelport will soon further help PIA by giving it the opportunity to create NDC connections and display NDC-based airline content on its platform. Commenting on the new deal, Ali Tahir, Chief Commercial Officer at Pakistan International Airlines, said, “Travelport has been a valued partner to PIA for a number of years. By expanding our relationship with the company to cover the Americas and Asia-Pacific, two strategically important regions for us, we will provide our loyal customers with greater access to our flights and open up significant new growth opportunities for our business.” David Gomes, Head of Middle East, Africa, Turkey and Pakistan, Air – Travel Partners, Travelport, added, “PIA is highly valued by travel agencies in all corners of the world due it its vast international network, high quality service and large customer base. We are delighted the airline has chosen to expand its partnership with us. We are fully committed to supporting the company in achieving its international growth objectives and look forward to continuing to work with its world-class team.”

Travelport has become the first GDS operator to manage the live booking of flights using the International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) New Distribution Capability (NDC) technical standard. The first transaction was made by a British agency, Meon Valley Travel, on October 19 for a short-haul low-cost flight from London to Milan issued by a major European carrier. The new capability allows bookings to be made for any services on the airline without incurring a surcharge. Travelport’s new NDC capability is enabled using similar XML connections to those Travelport already deploys with APIs for over 20 low-cost carriers. The company published a roadmap for its initial range of NDC products in February, having been the first GDS operator in December 2017 to acquire Level 3 certification from IATA as an aggregator. It will also be followed by a series of product enhancements, including a version for online agents in 2019. Gordon Wilson, President and CEO, Travelport, said: “We are delighted to have taken a lead in bringing the NDC era to life. It has required an extraordinary amount of skill and expertise to make this happen and I want to thank my own colleagues at Travelport as well as our partners. We are still at the earliest stages of NDC deployment. Its evolution will continue to take time as we learn from the practical experience of its first use. Meanwhile, we continue to offer a comprehensive global travel commerce platform capable of handling mass volumes of searchable and bookable content at speed for the world’s travel providers and agents.”