May 09, 2012 - 01:35 PM ET

Receipt optical character recognition providers Abukai and Lemon partnered with Concur, the companies announced. Abukai's and Lemon's mobile apps allow users to take phone pictures of receipts and upload them to Concur Expense through the Connect platform. Another new Concur Connect partner, TravelText, transforms text messages into expense reports.

May 04, 2012 - 09:15 AM ET

Aeromexico is expanding its UATP program to additional markets following a January 2012 launch in three countries "with varying corporate accounts," according to Aeromexico chief commercial officer Sergio Allard. "We are taking our UATP program globally and offering a multitude of options for our corporate client base." The Mexican carrier in November 2011 first announced plans to provide UATP payment programs.

May 03, 2012 - 09:40 AM ET

The General Services Administration's $1.5 billion, 15-year ETS2 contract will be awarded in June, Concur chairman and CEO Steve Singh estimated. "There's obviously been a bit of a scandal across the GSA around expense reporting and, frankly, just spending outside of policy," Singh said, referencing the federal agency's 2010 Western Regions Conference scandal, which resulted in the resignation of GSA administrator Martha Johnson. Singh cited the leadership change for the delay. The massive ETS2 travel and expense management contract, widely expected to be awarded to both Concur and a joint CWTSatoTravel/Northrop Grumman bid, previously was targeted for April. If it indeed does win a portion of the deal, Concur is not expecting revenue from it until 2014. Meanwhile, Concur on Wednesday reported "exceptionally strong" March quarter results, including revenue of $108.4 million. That came in at 28 percent higher than a year earlier, the company's "highest year-over-year growth rate since the beginning of the recession," CFO Frank Pelzer said.

April 24, 2012 - 09:30 AM ET

AirPlus International in the first quarter "settled 11 percent more business flights than last year" and projected a "stable upward trend" for the coming months. The corporate payment specialist also posted a 2011 annual result of €30.5 million, up from €25.1 million a year earlier. It previously reported that annual settlement volume in 2011 for the first time surpassed €10 billion. The company indicated that new customer acquisition in Asia/Pacific fueled its growth.

April 04, 2012 - 04:25 PM ET

ExpenseAnywhere will debut by the third quarter foreign language versions of its expense management tool as it creates customized systems for emerging markets, the company announced. "India, in particular, has shown significant interest as the country is developing quickly and many companies are looking for software solutions to organize and streamline their growing expense management processes," said CEO Ashok Dhar. 

April 04, 2012 - 12:15 PM ET

CORRECTION: A March 14 BTN report misstated the value of HRG's purchase of the portion of Spendvision that it did not already own. HRG paid £8.464 million (US$13.5 million) in cash and new stock shares worth £4.976 million (US$7.8 million) to buy the remaining 42 percent of Spendvision. A corrected version appears here.

March 27, 2012 - 01:45 PM ET

U.S. Bank said it began issuing to U.S.-based corporate customers new cards with both a magnetic stripe and chip technology. The Global EMV commercial cards ensure that "purchases can be conveniently processed around the world," according to the company. The dual technology cards are offered as an option for most corporate payment accounts, but are the standard for the bank's Executive and Executive Platinum cards.

March 21, 2012 - 06:10 PM ET

Concur said it partnered with five pharma solution providers to support corporate compliance with provisions of the U.S. Affordable Care Act that will require drug, biologic and medical device makers to track expenses related to marketing to physicians and teaching hospitals and report such expenses to a publicly accessible national database. Through Concur's Connect platform, corporations can upload and report expenses to and obtain provider data from AdvantageMS, Healthcare Data Solutions, MedPro Systems, Porzio Pharmaceutical Services and R-Squared. Under these terms of the federal law, also known as the Physician Payments Sunshine Act, such reporting was to begin in March 2013, but late last year that deadline was delayed. The U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services last month closed a comment period on its proposed rule and is expected to release a final rule and reporting deadlines. 

March 14, 2012 - 09:25 AM ET

Hogg Robinson Group said it planned to purchase the remaining shares of Spendvision it doesn't already own from the expense firm's current and former directors and one of its founding shareholders. When the £13.44 million (US$21.3 million) deal—£4.976 million (US$7.8 million) in HRG shares and £8.464 million (US$13.5 million) in cash—is completed later this month, Spendvision COO Shane Bruhns will be named CEO of the subsidiary, headquartered in the United Kingdom with offices in Australia, Japan, New Zealand and the United States. HRG was the majority owner of the 100-person firm and first invested in it in 2004.

CORRECTION, April 4: An earlier version of this report misstated the value of the deal. 

March 08, 2012 - 09:05 AM ET

AirPlus International and JPMorgan Chase announced a "strategic partnership" to provide multinational organizations with corporate card and travel expense management programs. "Together, we are delivering a compelling alternative to traditional corporate card programs," according to J.P. Morgan Global Commercial Card Solutions president Andrew Pilkington. The companies said they would offer "a complete suite" of travel and entertainment payment solutions, adding that "new and innovative" features and benefits will be announced "in the coming months." J.P. Morgan Global Commercial Card claims "more than 6,000 public and private sector clients and more than 6 million cardholders." According to AirPlus executive board chairman Patrick Diemer, the partnership will "bring us ever closer to our goals of becoming the preferred global provider of business travel payment solutions."

March 05, 2012 - 12:20 PM ET

Databasics announced mobile versions of its expense reporting and employee time tracking products. The mobile versions, available for iPhone, Android and BlackBerry devices, "offer all the capabilities including receipt capture, multiple currency, project distribution and per diem calculations," according to the company, which added that mobile versions are based on HTML5 technology. Databasics also noted that to ensure security, "no data is kept on the mobile or tablet device." Other travel technology companies recently have announced mobile versions of their services, including Grasp Technologies, Prime Numbers Technology and TRX.

March 01, 2012 - 10:40 AM ET

American Express Global Corporate Payments and Concur said they brought their global alliance to Japan, the 15th market in which they promote each others products. Concur a year ago announced expansion to Japan with the formation of a joint venture with SunBridge Corp., and last month launched the Concur Expense spend management system in that market. As part of the relationship, joint clients receive reports detailing Amex card data and non-card data, “helping companies identify areas of spend that are outside of company policy," according to the companies.