American Express Business Travel announced plans to release a new, dashboard-style global reporting system that compiles purchasing data from more than 60 critical global business markets. Called AXIS @ Work, the Web-based management information system "will be made available globally and rolled out over the coming months," Amex said.
Speaking last month during the National Business Travel Association conference here, American Express Business Travel North America senior vice president and general manager Andrew McGraw said his company considered other options but ultimately selected the same vendor that powers Amex's current reporting system, called American Express @ Work Reporting.
McLean, Va.-based software developer MicroStrategy Inc. is helping Amex build the new product, which features an enhanced user interface, dashboards with key indicators, standardized reports and an option for customizable reports. Further developments in meetings management and carbon emissions calculators are expected, according to an Amex statement.
Amex also created a new management information practice area within its advisory services group to support the product, McGraw said. The department's consultants integrate data from the tool with such other supplier data such as corporate card, airline and hotel spend to determine savings opportunities and strategies for better management.
The AXIS product can be customized so that travel managers first see the indicators most important to them, McGraw said. Key data points could include top suppliers used, budgeting information, ticket prices, adoption and compliance rates, or other required data. There are five dashboard views from which to choose, as well as multiple languages and currencies.
Meanwhile, McGraw made the case for a number of aspects of multinational travel management, noting how the rising influence of corporate procurement and finance departments has helped drive globalization. These groups already purchase commodities on a global scale for their companies, and push similar strategies for travel expenditures, he said.
"A global partnership is no longer a 'nice to have,' but is a requirement for doing business," McGraw said. "Globalization does not discriminate across business segments. There are businesses, for example, in the middle market that are becoming very interested in their globalization strategies."
About 50 percent of middle-market clients that are new to the advisory services group are doing business in at least two countries, he said, adding that online booking tool adoption is also accelerating overseas.
"In mature markets in Europe, like the United Kingdom, online penetration grew by nearly 30 percent year over year," he said. "In Australia, online booking has gained 13 percent over last year to reach 33 percent penetration."
Meanwhile, McGraw said Amex has signed more than 500 customers to its new Axiom online travel marketplace, powered by Rearden Commerce. Amex, which has a minority equity stake in Rearden, participates with Rearden in a joint development council that now is considering a global rollout strategy for the Rearden procurement platform.
McGraw also announced that American Express had acquired the 63 percent share of Hong Kong-based joint venture Farrington American Express Travel Services Limited that it did not already own. Farrington Travel and Amex first partnered in 1999.
The new wholly owned company markets to the Greater China region, including the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan, where "business volume" has reached $1 billion this year with double-digit growth over 2006, according to Amex.