BUSINESS NEWS


Amex GBT’s Paul Abbott said in May 2022: ‘There will be pressure for consolidation because of the requirement for investment in product and technology’


Amex-CWT tie-up banks on business travel upturn


Firms eye $155m ‘synergy’ savings to drive shareholder value. Ian Taylor reports


American Express Global Business Travel’s acquisition of rival CWT, announced on March 25, will combine the largest travel management company in the UK and Europe with the fourth-largest in the UK and European number three. However, it is a deal made in the


US, with New York-based Amex GBT listed on the New York Stock Exchange and CWT, formerly Carlson Wagonlit Travel, based in Minneapolis. Amex GBT chief executive Paul


Abbott declared the acquisition would “create more choice for customers, more opportunities for people and


64 4 APRIL 2024


more value for shareholders”. Two of these outcomes are debatable given the companies are rivals. The third explains the deal, with the combined business targeting $155 million in savings through “synergies” and Abbott noting it would swell the group’s SME business by about $5 billion. The bigger company continues


to trade as Amex GBT despite being renamed Global Business Travel Group Inc (GBT Group) following its merger with a ‘special purpose acquisition company’ (SPAC), Apollo Strategic Growth Capital, in 2021 and listing in New York with a market


capitalisation of $5.3 billion in 2022. The Apollo SPAC was set up by


US venture capital giant Apollo Global Management, private equity firm Ares, virtual meetings group Zoom, travel tech firm Sabre and investment advisor HG Vora. They joined Amex GBT’s


existing investors – former owner American Express, private equity firm Certares, and Expedia Group which acquired a shareholding when Amex GBT bought the group’s corporate


Continued on page 62 travelweekly.co.uk


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