Airlines Reporting Corp. has finalized Avianca's New Distribution Capability implementation with the ARC Direct Connect program, ARC announced Tuesday.
The partnership will "help differentiate Avianca's products and allow access to content previously only available in the airline's direct channel," ARC senior manager of Direct Connect and One Order Paige Blunt said in a statement. The carrier also will be able to "expand its reach into the Puerto Rican market and allow more passengers to take advantage of Avianca's network," according to ARC.
During an interview at the Global Business Travel Association annual convention last month, ARC VP of distribution and financial services Chuck Fischer said ARC has a "healthy pipeline" of carriers in place for ARC Direct Connect, with about 10 queued up to join the approximately two dozen already participating by the end of the year. He said ARC is seeing "healthy growth" in use, with the proportion of airline transactions handled through ARC Direct Connect nearing 13 percent of total transactions, up from about 7 percent at the beginning of the year.
The growth, however, has been faster on the leisure side. "Leisure is where it's all started and what we're seeing the most of, but corporate is growing—just much more slowly," Fischer said.
— With additional reporting by Michael B. Baker.