Rearden Commerce's September acquisition of automated ground transportation reservation provider Global Ground Automation was the the firm's second purchase since its $100 million cash infusion in May. While the company has broadened its travel technology holdings beyond its Personal Assistant online procurement platform with GGA and expense management software provider ExpenseWire, Rearden CEO Patrick Grady said the buys signal no break from the company's strategy of feeding the core Personal Assistant product.
Meanwhile, the company has expanded its distribution network with Orbitz for Business and TRX for online booking and expense integrations and in 2009 plans to deliver consumer and small and midsize business versions of the Personal Assistant through newest investor JPMorgan Chase.
This quarter, Rearden is implementing global distribution system Amadeus into the product. Currently, Rearden is available in North America and the United Kingdom.
Grady would not disclose market-specific rollout plans for Rearden, but he did acknowledge that the Amadeus agreement lays the groundwork for deployment in continental Europe.
Grady claims about 2,300 corporations, including 1.8 million individual subscribers, are using the Personal Assistant. Those using American Express Business Travel's Axiom version represent a "significant percentage, but not a significant majority" of those users.
Meanwhile, buoyed by investments from JPMorgan, American Express and smaller venture capital firms
(BTNonline, May 12), Rearden has grown its employee base to 400—75 percent to 80 percent of which come from business-to-consumer e-commerce companies, including Amazon, eBay and PayPal, Grady said. Others come from such corporate travel technology companies as TRX and Sabre. Overall about 75 percent are devoted to research and development.
As Rearden now owns GGA and ExpenseWire
(BTNonline, July 21), which have existing and new relationships with Rearden competitors, Grady said the company is modeled on a business-to-consumer methodology that reinforces an open philosophy and technology development. "If I believed in locking in customers, I would have never signed agreements with Orbitz for Business or TRX," Grady said.
Prior to Rearden's summer purchase of ExpenseWire, Orbitz for Business had been close to a deal with the expense management company for integrated booking and expense reporting capabilities, but new terms were reached with Rearden. On a "day-to-day basis," ExpenseWire manages the partnership with Orbitz, according to Orbitz for Business COO Dean Sivley.
"They are treating ExpenseWire as a separate application and business unit," said Sivley. "They have really walked the talk in terms of separating the church and state. While we'll compete against them in certain cases with them as an online booking tool with an agency and us as an agency with our own technology for booking, there are aspects where we'll bring ExpenseWire in to complement us, and they are OK with that, as are we."