Briefly

GBTA Supports But U.S. Travel And ASTA Oppose Trump Administration Move To Exclude New York Residents From Trusted Traveler Programs

David Jonas

The Global Business Travel Association expressed support for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s decision to suspend enrollments and renewals in Global Entry and related “trusted traveler” programs for New York state residents. The statement differed from what two other industry groups, the American Society of Travel Advisors and the U.S. Travel Association, had to…

Wex To Acquire Enett, The Virtual Payment Firm Majority-Owned By Travelport

Jay Campbell

Wex agreed to buy fellow business-to-business payments firm eNett and transaction optimization company Optal for a combined $1.7 billion. That includes $1.275 billion in cash and 2 mIllion shares of Wex stock. Enett is a joint venture majority owned by Travelport, with Optal (formerly PSP International) a minority owner. Enett offers virtual payment solutions for…

NuTravel, Delta Build Out Direct Business Travel Booking

David Jonas

When ARC this week announced its investment in nuTravel, the latter’s CEO referenced a new “global airline” customer. Looks like it’s Delta. “At the end of this quarter, we will introduce new functionality, powered by nuTravel, that enables the management of delta.com business bookings and allows for duty of care, payment management, expense provider integrations and…

More Lodging Industry Data Shows Slowing Travel Growth

David Jonas

Lodging industry performance reports and forecasts published this week by research firms showed continued weakness. They are the latest data points reflecting or predicting a general softening, including for business travel. For the week ended Nov. 17, STR reported lower U.S. occupancy (down 1.9 percentage points year over year to 64.2 percent), a slightly lower…

World Travel Inc. President Dee Runyan Leaves For CorpTrav

Jay Campbell

Dee Runyan left her post as president of World Travel Inc. to join Chicago-area travel management company CorpTrav as chief operating officer.  The highly regarded TMC executive replaced Mary Batal-Riley who, after a two-year stint as CorpTrav COO, this summer became global travel manager at Baxter International, according to her LinkedIn profile. In her new…

ATG Teams With IBM To Build Voice-Enabled Booking

Jay Campbell

Ohio-based ATG Business Travel Management plans by mid-2020 to release a voice-powered booking application thanks to a strategic partnership with IBM.  Backed by historical travel and expense data, business traveler profiles and company policies, the new booking function will be “more than a chatbot,” according to Tammy Krings, CEO at ATG Worldwide. Krings claimed that essentially…

Kayak Starts Talking, A Little, About Kayak For Business

Jay Campbell

[UPDATE, Dec. 11, 2019: Kayak evidently deleted the blog referenced below.] Kayak For Business is real, but what is it?  After declining to comment for an article published on this site last December about efforts to build a solution for businesses, the company recently started publishing blog posts about it.  There’s a new category about…

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