Amadeus announces milestone IT achievements

CSA Czech Airlines, Caribbean Sun, Aeromexico and Aviacsa among new customer wins for stand-alone IT applications designed to grow revenue

Madrid, 11 October, 2005: Today, Amadeus announces a series of milestone achievements from its Airline Business Group which has secured the group’s position as a leading IT provider to the airline sector in parallel to its world-leading distribution business. A EUR 300 million investment in research and development and its 20-year heritage in the travel and tourism sector has proved a winning combination for Amadeus.

Following the announcement last month that Star Alliance will adopt the Amadeus Altéa Customer Management Solution (CMS)*, one of the most significant technology projects in the airline sector, Amadeus demonstrates that Altéa CMS is bringing benefits to all types of full service carriers, major, network and regional.

Finnair, dba, Qantas and British Airways testify to a return on investment with Altéa CMS

Network carrier Finnair is the latest airline to successfully migrate to the new generation inventory management module of Amadeus Altéa CMS, first launched a year ago. Commenting on the move, Tom Källstrom, Vice President e-Business Development, Commercial Division at Finnair says, "In a 16-hour operation, all Finnair flight data representing some 200,000 flight dates, an average 500 daily departures and some 25,000 passenger flight records (PNRs) each day, were migrated seamlessly to Altéa Inventory (Plan). And we were delighted to see immediate, considerable savings as a result of totally switching off our old inventory system one week after successful cutover." Finnair estimates that Altéa CMS, a community IT platform used by many airlines, will enable it to reduce system development costs by 15 - 40 per cent. "We expect to ultimately see a payback on this investment within three years," adds Källstrom.

In readiness for Finnair’s eventual move to Altéa Departure Control (Fly), Amadeus is also taking over the hosting of Finnair’s check-in system FIDO and tour operator reservation system MARS. Both systems will be hosted at Amadeus’ global data centre in Germany.

Altéa CMS is built on a common platform environment, with every technical advance shared throughout a community of airlines. This is critical for carriers like the second largest German domestic carrier dba, who get exactly the same level of technology development as the larger airlines, but without the burdening system development and maintenance costs required.

Already using Altéa Reservation (Sell), dba recognised the need for further IT solutions that would ensure continued productivity while on the road to operational expansion. Following a risk-free migration to Altéa Inventory in June this year, dba became the first regional airline to improve its revenue opportunities with the solution.

Altéa Inventory has brought dba a new capacity to optimise its fleet and manage equipment changes quicker. Claus Fischer, Commercial Development and Planning Director at dba, says "With the inventory module of Altéa we can change aircraft type quickly and easily. If a flight is cancelled and customers have to be shifted to another aircraft, Altéa Inventory flashes up the right aircraft type code in an instant. Juggling assets in this way used to require about five minutes, the same job now takes five seconds."

For Qantas, which has been using Altéa Inventory for a year and Altéa Reservation for over two years, the business benefits of Altéa CMS lie in a number of areas. "In reservations we are able to publish changes and get them into the market very quickly," says Fiona Balfour, Chief Information Officer and Executive General Manager Qantas. "In inventory the step change in capability - mainly driven by technology and the clarity of design - is outstanding. The most remarkable change from a productivity and data quality perspective is schedule change - what previously took three weeks now takes half an hour to load."

British Airways, an Altéa CMS launch customer, also reports significant results. "Without question, our move onto Altéa Reservation has given us a very sound foundation from which to pursue what has been a key strategy for British Airways in recent years, changing the path through which customers book their journey," says Mike Thorne, British Airways’ Manager for Amadeus Business & Product. "The range, capability and depth of product and service that we are getting from Altéa Reservation has made this possible. Additionally, with Altéa Inventory, we now have a toolset which enhances our ability to manage our inventory and hence improve our revenue and yield. From managing this on a flight by flight basis, we are now able to look at countries of sale, routes and markets."

150 carriers worldwide are currently using Altéa Reservation as their sales system. And besides newly-signed Lufthansa and United Airlines, 22 airlines are in various stages of implementation of Altéa Inventory and Altéa Departure Control.

More carriers reap benefits of Amadeus’ standalone IT solutions

Amadeus is also seeing an increasing number of airlines sign up to use its stand-alone IT applications designed to help airlines maximise their revenue opportunities. CSA Czech Airlines, Caribbean Sun, Aeromexico and Aviacsa, are the newest additions to a total of 29 airlines across four continents that have adopted Amadeus’ revenue integrity technology. Amadeus Revenue Integrity makes predicting the number of no-shows much more accurate, allowing airlines to fill their planes with paying customers instead of empty seats. Airlines have testified to reducing no-shows from 13% to 4% within days of starting to use the solution.

Amadeus’ e-Travel Airline Suite has also been instrumental in supporting airlines’ strategies to increase their profitability levels through the use of e-retail and e-merchandise solutions that enhance profitability and customer loyalty.

In the first half of 2005, internet bookings processed by Amadeus e-Retail Engine (Planitgo) increased by 67% compared to the same period in 2004. This represents an overall online booking value of more than EUR 2 billion for the 60 plus carriers using Amadeus e-Retail Engine in these six months.

Similarly, Portugalia and Malev Hungarian Airlines are the most recent of 28 airlines to adopt Amadeus Electronic Ticketing Server (ETS), an outsourced platform for management and distribution of electronic tickets. A preferred supplier of IATA, Amadeus is actively assisting airlines in the uptake of industry standard processes such as IATA’s 100% e-ticketing deadline for the end of 2007. Amadeus today facilitates e-ticket distribution for over 100 carriers in over 110 markets worldwide - more than any other solution provider. Specifically, Amadeus ETS has driven the e-ticketing roll-out capacity for oneworld, which has led the industry in implementing interline e-ticketing across all its members. oneworld carriers Aer Lingus, British Airways, Finnair, LanChile and Qantas, have outsourced the management and distribution of their electronic tickets to system-neutral ETS, allowing them to interline with the rest of the carriers in the alliance. 24 other airlines which are hosted on third party technology also enjoy interlining facilities via Amadeus.


Notes to the editors:

*The Amadeus Altéa CMS portfolio comprises: Amadeus Altéa Reservation (Sell), a multi-channel sales and reservation platform; Amadeus Altéa Inventory (Plan), a new generation inventory management solution; and Amadeus Altéa Departure Control (Fly), a new generation departure control solution.

About Amadeus
A world-leading technology and distribution solutions provider, Amadeus delivers unparalleled expertise to the travel and tourism industry, including leading-edge solutions that cover airlines’ unique business needs, independent of their size, business model or market reach.

Amadeus’ pioneering new generation Customer Management Solution (CMS) portfolio, Amadeus Altéa CMS, serves network and regional carriers. The Altéa portfolio, based on a pioneering community platform concept, enables improved operational efficiency and increases revenue. The portfolio consists of the Altéa Reservation (Sell), Altéa Inventory (Plan) and Altéa Departure Control (Fly) solutions.

Low Cost Carriers have alternative Customer Management Solutions - Pioneer CMS and Results CMS by Amadeus - based on adaptive technology that provides robust options that easily adjust to their evolving operational requirements.

Further complimenting these integrated IT solutions is the Amadeus e-Travel Airline Suite that includes the Amadeus e-Retail engine, which powers more than 120 websites of over 60 airlines.

Other standalone IT solutions include: revenue integrity and automatic ticket reissue tools, in addition to full e-ticket interlining and ground-handling management technology services.

For further information, please click here.