Inside Track - 1996-10-14

By AUTHOR / October 13, 1996

<H1> Inside Track</H1>Amex Targets Intranets

The Amex-Microsoft partnership plans "more focus on intranet solutions" as it develops its suite of corporate booking products, according to American Express Interactive Travel Group vice president Mike Mulligan.

In his keynote speech to the Travel Technology Association's Open Forum conference, held earlier this month in Chicago, Mulligan predicted that the number of corporate intranet sites will grow from 75,000 today to 4.5 million by the year 2000.

Meanwhile, the team's corporate travel system, in development under the code name Rome (BTN, July 29), is on schedule to begin beta testing in January, with general release in June. "We are finalizing the specs this week, and then will sit down with corporate customers and ask what we've got right and what we've got wrong," Mulligan said. The current plan is "to launch with Sabre and Galileo on day one, and soon after to offer all CRSs."

Meanwhile, TravelNet chairman John Shoolery said he will soon be announcing "a connection that looks into more than one place for information, and accesses supplementary inventory" to that offered in the CRS.

SAS: No Caps

Scandinavian Airlines System's director of corporate and agent programs Lennart Lof said that despite previous reports, "SAS has no plans to introduce caps on commissions." Meanwhile, SAS and Air Canada expect their marketing alliance signed last week-which further strengthens the five-way partnership among the two carriers and United, Lufthansa and Thai Airways-to be initiated by April. Lufthansa said its alliance with SAS will earn it more than $65 million next year; the German carrier made about that much from its alliance with United this year.

Rosenbluth Unveils Tech Center

Travel managers who missed meeting Hal Rosenbluth at his mime-filled National Business Travel Association convention booth in Dallas might want to visit a new standing exhibit of present and future technologies at the eponymous mega agency's Philadelphia headquarters.

The Continuum-billed as a "cross between a think tank and Epcot Center"-will serve as a permanent site for customers to brainstorm with representatives of 17 Rosenbluth technology and vendor partners, including AT&T, British Airways, Continental, Galileo, Hertz, United, USAir, Wyndham Hotels and Visa International.

Speaking at the opening ceremonies last week, Visa emerging markets and technologies vice president Win Derman mentioned a new product, an "electronic travelers check" called the Visa Travel Money Card, that has successfully completed beta testing in four countries. Like a travelers check, the card offers protection from loss or theft in return for cash up front. Users would get two cards-an active one and a spare. They would use the first card, converting it to cash at any time through an ATM, as they travel. But if the card is lost or stolen, they could simply call Visa, deactivate the lost one and activate the spare, and have immediate access to their cash again.

Boarding Pass ATMs

TWA in the first half of next year will introduce airport "ATMs" to issue boarding passes, reminiscent of Continental's E-ticket machines. Last week, TWA rolled out electronic ticketing throughout its domestic system.

AA To boot up Laptop Power

American Airlines announced that its rollout of in-flight power ports for laptop computers (BTN, March 18) will begin in December. The carrier said users will be required to provide their own adapter, which is the same as standard adapters used for the cigarette lighters in cars.

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