Buying Business Travel’s regular look at the news, innovations and people in the industry’s technology sector
UK OPERATORS TO BE INCLUDED
IN AMADEUS RAIL GDS Rob Gill reports from the technology company’s rail conference at its development HQ in Nice
THE UK’S MAJOR RAIL companies are set to be included by the end of the year in a new global distribution system (GDS) for rail being developed by technology giant Amadeus. Amadeus sees pulling together train
content from operators across the world as the “last unsolved problem in travel”. It held a two-day rail forum for train operators and the travel trade at its research and development facility in Sophia Antipolis in southern France. The company is already working on the Total
Rail project with European train operators such as Italy’s Trenitalia, SNCF in France, Germany’s Deutsche-Bahn and SJ in Sweden. Amadeus intends to integrate content
from the 24 UK rail companies, which belong to the Association of Train Operating Companies (ATOC), during 2013. Thomas Drexler, global head of Amadeus Rail, said it was a “long-term project” aimed at creating a “GDS for rail” which would allow travel management companies (TMCs) to compare train fares with those of airlines operating on the same routes. “The question is how to efficiently distribute railways all around the globe,” Drexler told Buying Business Travel. “It’s a lot of work because there’s no one set of standards for rail – unlike air, where you have standards set down by IATA [the International Air Transport Association] for airline products and fares.”
Amadeus has built up a team of 250 people, including 200 developers, to work on the project and Drexler said it would be done “step by step”. “We are already up and running with
Trenitalia – you can compare flights between Milan and Rome versus the train, both for price and travel time,” he said. “There will be more to come – including all the content from the ATOC companies in the UK, which we will be integrating this year. Eurostar is already on the system which is very important for the ATOC content, because you need that link to the continent.” Drexler added that TMCs had been one of the driving forces in encouraging Amadeus to go ahead with the rail project. “Being able to compare air with rail, as well as other modes of transport, is something that the TMCs see a lot of value in,” he said. “We also know that corporations would like to see it added into self-booking tools.” Drexler said the aim for the end of 2013
was to see Europe’s top “four or five” rail operators, including all ATOC members, included in the system.
“This is a good opportunity as we know the demand for rail is there and we have the technology,” he added. “The TMCs have been one of the strongest drivers and we will be working together with them on this.”
Thomas Drexler
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SJ SIGNS UP FOR AMADEUS RAIL PLATFORM
SWEDEN’S SJ has become the latest European train operator to join Amadeus Rail’s GDS. SJ, which is the country’s biggest rail operator, is joining other European railways such as Trenitalia and SNCF on the platform. The agreement
means SJ’s inventory will be distributed through Amadeus’s offline and online channels for travel agents for the first time. SJ will also continue to be offered through the corporate self-booking tool Amadeus E-Travel Management.
Head of Amadeus Rail, Thomas Drexler, said: “This is yet another important step towards offering both a global platform and a multi-provider solution for effective rail distribution. Travel sellers will have access to all fares, and
all origins and destinations worldwide. Moreover, SJ’s international sales in 2011 alone represented a little less than 2 per cent of SJ’s total sales, illustrating that the commercial opportunity for both SJ and Amadeus is huge.”