Amadeus and Sabre today announced an agreement that enables each global distribution system to leverage the other for access to fares from nonparticipating carriers. Amadeus in a statement said the agreement allows customers "to complete bookings on an airline in the unlikely event of that airline withdrawing from participation in Amadeus. Amadeus will offer the same back-up for Sabre." Financial terms were not disclosed.
Ron DiLeo, American Express senior vice president for EMEA Business Travel, said the agreement gives travel managers "better data, better compliance and one place for multinational inventory."
"We continue to do business as we normally do and we continue to compete as vigorously as we have," a Sabre spokesperson said. "This really is an insurance policy for our travel agents, corporations and travelers to make sure they can continue to travel without disruption."
Sabre said the deal covers only airline content, since "it is in the area of air that there has been a lot of noise and rhetoric-including some speculation that an airline may withdraw from one of the systems."
"A lot of the airlines are threatening to withdraw content from the channel," said Andrew Winterton, American Express vice president and global leader of the Supplier Relations Group. "This agreement makes it far more difficult to implement that threat."
In a filing submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission today, Sabre said it is not working with other GDS companies on similar agreements, yet would not disclose whether it is pursuing other projects with Amadeus, noting "We will not comment on future activities."
Sabre said the deal is not without precedent, as the GDS already leverages other distribution partners in various regions outside of the United States, including Abacus in Asia and Falcon in the Middle East. "It's not unprecedented, but what gets people's attention is that it's Amadeus and Sabre," a spokesperson said.
Sabre asserted that the agreement does not lessen its ongoing attempts to sign major U.S. airlines to full content deals, many of which are up for expiration this year. Sabre, which recently signed Northwest and US Airways to separate five-year, full- content arrangement
(BTN, Feb. 6), now has full content from carriers that make up 20 percent of the U.S. market and expects that others will follow. "We have signed up over 200 carriers worldwide for full-content one-year agreements, and are having productive conversations with the other DCA 3 carriers," a Sabre spokesperson said.