Hillgate Travel on Oct. 1 will join the GlobalStar Travel Management agency network. Hillgate is the latest U.K. addition to GlobalStar, which continues to fill the hole left in several European countries when ATP International discontinued its operating agreement in July
(BTNonline, Aug. 17).
London-based Hillgate, one of the largest travel management companies in the United Kingdom, has more than $200 million in annual sales and 185 employees in three offices. According to GlobalStar chairman and New York-based Ultramar Travel Management president and CEO Peter Klebanow, many of Hillgate's clients are in the financial services and legal sectors. He also noted the TMC was the former local agency for the now-defunct Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers.
Hillgate joins Chambers Travel Management as the two U.K. GlobalStar licensees. Chambers joined in August. Klebanow said the network could add one more U.K.-based partner, which specializes in managing travel for companies in the oil and gas industry.
As tier-one GlobalStar members, both Chambers and Hillgate have a representative on the GlobalStar board.
GlobalStar still has to add agency members in France, Germany and in former-ATP served countries Belgium, The Netherlands and Norway. Most of these gaps will be closed by the end of 2009, Klebanow said.
According to GlobalStar executive director of marketing Mark van Iersel, who also runs partner recruitment, multiple partners could be added in Germany, where business travel volumes often are spread countrywide. In France, GlobalStar most likely will add one or two partners in Paris, where 85 percent of the country's volume resides, he said.