As New
Distribution Capability continues to gain traction, airlines, booking tools,
global distribution systems and other companies are announcing new partnerships
to make NDC content available for booking. Airlines also are beginning to adopt
offer-and-order management technologies, another step in business travel’s modern-retailing
journey. This page will provide a running list of those news briefs, with the
most recent at the top. Help keep BTN up to date by sending NDC development news to BTN executive editor Michael B. Baker [email protected].
- Airlines
Reporting Corp. has integrated Philippine Airlines into Direct Connect, ARC’s
airline distribution platform that enables NDC transactions, ARC announced June
17. - Serko has integrated Amadeus’ NDC content and technology into its Zeno
travel and expense platform, the company announced June 17. Currently, 35
airlines provide NDC content to the Amadeus Travel Platform. The integration
would give its TMC and corporate clients an additional means of accessing NDC
offers in advance of the launch of Qantas’ new distribution
model next month.
Serko also is working to add more flexibility to Amadeus NDC bookings,
including combining NDC and EDIFACT fares in a single booking and the ability
to cancel NDC bookings before they are ticketed. - Riyadh Air has signed
its first global distribution agreement with Sabre, the technology company
announced May 13. The newly established national carrier for Saudi Arabia will
have Sabre offer traditional EDIFACT content as well as NDC content. Riyadh previously
selected SabreMosaic for its offer-and-order management capabilities. The
carrier plans to begin flights by the end of 2025. - Travelport will offer
Latam’s NDC content under the terms of an extended agreement, the
technology company announced May 13. Travelport-connected agencies will be able
to offer both EDIFACT and NDC content via Travelport Plus. The company did not
provide a timeline for when the NDC content would go live. - Finnair
has created its first “native order” with Amadeus’ Nevio technology as the carrier transitions to an offer-and-order system and away from
traditional booking methods that use passenger name records and e-tickets, the
airline announced May 13. - Sabre
has activated NDC content for Air France and KLM in its travel marketplace,
the travel technology company announced May 6. Sabre-connected agencies now can
access the carriers’ NDC content via Sabre’s Offers and Orders APIs, the Sabre
Red 360 agency booking solution, Sabre Red Launchpad, and “a range of
online booking tools,” according to the company. The integrations will
allow for continuous pricing. - Aeromexico will use
Sabre’s SabreMosaic offer-and-offer retailing platform under
an expanded agreement, the travel technology company announced May 5. Sabre did
not provide an implementation date. The modular SabreMosaic partnership
includes Air Price IQ and Ancillary IQ solutions “to enhance
personalization and maximize revenue.” Both products are AI-driven and
will enable Aeromexico to provide dynamic pricing and personalized ancillary
offers based on traveler behavior, according to Sabre. - American Express
Global Business Travel and Delta Air Lines have expanded their long-term
agreement to include Delta’s NDC offers in the Amex GBT marketplace when they
become available, the travel management company announced May 1. The
agreement also enables travelers to choose from Delta’s range of branded
fares—including joint venture partners Aeromexico, Latam, Korean Air, Virgin
Atlantic, Air France and KLM—in one display in Amex GBT’s booking
channels. Delta has said it is building
and testing an NDC solution, and officials in March
said a large-scale launch was unlikely
to happen in 2025. - ARC has added Royal
Jordanian Airlines’ NDC content into the ARC Direct Connect program, ARC
announced April 30. The integration enables the carrier to offer
“more personalized, efficient services to our valued customers in the U.S.
market,” Royal Jordanian chief commercial officer Karime Makhlouf said in
a statement. - Frontier Airlines has
partnered with Amadeus to offer the carrier’s NDC content via a GDS for the
first time, the airline announced April 29. The NDC offers will provide
“enhanced messaging” and “access to more options and more
visibility to the best pricing available,” according to Frontier. It also
will enable “enhanced ancillary services and personalized offers,”
and a more “streamlined process for making changes to travel
plans.” - Sabre Corp. has activated Iberia’s NDC content in its GDS,
the travel technology company announced April 29. Sabre-connected agents can
shop, book and service Iberia NDC offers alongside other Iberia content, such
as EDIFACT offers, in Sabre’s travel marketplace. - Amex GBT and Finnair
have partnered to expand new digital content, including NDC offerings, to
corporate clients, the travel management company announced Thursday. The
Finnair NDC content will be available to Amex GBT customers without any
surcharges, according to GBT. Finnair in 2024 pulled back on its previously
announced plan to exit from EDIFACT completely by year-end 2025, citing that
the “pace of change” toward modern airline retailing was taking
longer than anticipated, according to BTN stablemate
The Beat. - Travel and expense
platform Mesh is partnering to add Sabre’s NDC content to its travel-booking
capabilities, the companies announced April 15. The midmarket-focused Mesh,
which currently reports more than 2,000 customers, launched its travel
management platform in 2023, and Sabre was live with the platform at the time of that launch.
Adding Sabre’s NDC content will expand options and offer more competitive
pricing on the platform, according to Mesh. - Sabre has launched
British Airways’ NDC content in Sabre’s travel marketplace, the technology
company announced March 18. Sabre-connected travel agencies now can shop,
book and service BA NDC offers alongside traditional EDIFACT options. Agencies
can manage BA’s offers and orders through the Sabre Red 360 agency booking solution,
Sabre Red Launchpad and the Sabre Offer and Order APIs, according to
Sabre. - Sabre has launched
Chilean carrier Latam’s NDC content “in multiple countries,” Sabre announced Feb. 26. Six of Latam’s regionally branded subsidiary
carriers are included in this agreement, serving Chile, Brazil, Colombia,
Ecuador, Paraguay and Peru, according to the companies. In addition to
those six countries, 16 other countries were made active by this stage of
Latam’s NDC content rollout: the United States, Canada, Mexico, the United
Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland,
Argentina, Bolivia, Uruguay, Australia and New Zealand. The companies plan to
activate additional markets in the coming months. Sabre initially announced
its Latam NDC agreement in
October 2023. - Sabre-connected
agencies in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium and “additional
regions” now can book and service Lufthansa Group’s NDC content, Sabre
announced Feb. 24. Lufthansa Group includes the brands Lufthansa, Austrian
Airlines, Brussels Airlines, Swiss Air Dolomiti and Discover Airlines, formerly
Eurowings Discover. The rollout of Lufthansa Group NDC on Sabre platforms began last year, and the “home
markets” were the last to activate, according to a Sabre spokesperson. The
expansion brings Lufthansa Group’s NDC content to Sabre-connected travel
agencies in more than 100 countries. - Air France-KLM has partnered to use Amadeus’ Nevio
technology to deploy an offer-and-order system, the airline company
announced Feb. 18. The move to the new technology will be a “multi-year
effort,” according to Air France-KLM. Nevio will streamline purchases into
a single order as opposed to having multiple documents, such as a passenger
name record, an electronic ticket and electronic miscellaneous documents, for
each booking, according to Air France-KLM. - Icelandair has selected Amadeus Altea NDC as the carrier’s
NDC API provider, Amadeus announced Feb. 12, expanding the
companies’ relationship and enabling the distribution of the full range of the
airline’s content and fares, including web fares and NDC-based content, to
Amadeus-connected agents. Implementation is scheduled to start in the first
quarter of 2025, according to the technology company. - • Travelport has
expanded its partnership with Chase Travel Group, which includes Frosch and Valerie Wilson Travel, to provide
“enriched, multisource content from Travelport, in addition to modern
retailing tools and merchandising features” through the Travelport Plus
platform, the technology company announced Feb. 11. The expanded deal will
enable Chase Travel Group to consume and present content from multiple sources
and suppliers, including NDC and traditional content from air carriers, hotels
and car rental companies. - Travelport is
providing NDC content to Atriis as part of an expanded agreement with the
travel platform, the companies announced Feb. 3. Travelport’s NDC offers and
fares already are available to corporate clients in the Atriis platform, and
the agreement also includes access to low-cost carrier, hotel and car rental
content via Travelport. Atriis has previously announced NDC agreements with
both Amadeus and Sabre. - Amex GBThas
agreed to an “enhanced” agreement with Lufthansa Group to
“expand and accelerate availability” of the airline company’s
NDC-enabled fares, Amex GBT announced Feb. 3. The two companies have
already been working together to distribute
Lufthansa’s NDC content for several years. The new “renewed,
expanded” agreement is designed to accelerate the availability of
Lufthansa’s NDC fares and other content on Amex GBT’s proprietary platforms,
offline booking and third-party booking tools. It will also include access to
Lufthansa’s NDC-only rates and special promotions across the group’s airlines,
including Lufthansa, Swiss, Brussels Airlines and Austrian Airlines. - Sabre has started to
offer Saudi Arabian flag carrier Saudia’s NDC content in the Sabre marketplace,
the technology company announced Jan. 14. The new offering enables travel
agents, travel management companies and corporations to deliver tailored offers
to their customers, according to Sabre. The technology company added that the
development also marks the first time Saudia NDC content is available on a
global distribution system. Amadeus in December
announced it would begin to carry Saudia’s NDC content “in the
first quarter of 2025.” - ARC has implemented Vietnam Airlines’ NDC content into the
ARC Direct Connect program, ARC announced
Jan. 14. The partnership helps Vietnam Airlines deliver more personalized
traveler experiences while giving travel agencies and corporate buyers more
options to manage transactions, minimize risk and track data through ARC’s
settlement platform, according to ARC. - Travelport
will offer China Eastern Airlines’ NDC content under the terms of a new
multi-year agreement, the technology company announced Jan. 8.
Travelport did not specify a date when the NDC content would become available.
China Eastern is one of China’s three major carriers and a member of the
SkyTeam Alliance.
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