Travelport announced that the company is now the sole global distribution system (GDS) provider of Air India’s domestic flight content in India.
The contract, which was awarded to Travelport following a competitive bidding process, came into effect in November 2018 and was fully implemented as of 1 January 2020.
The company also continues to provide all domestic and international flight content from the carrier to its wide network of travel agents across the world.
The milestone comes just one month after Meenakshi Malik, Executive Director of Commercial Operations at Air India, revealed that the carrier had already seen “growth of 22%” in operational profit and “cut down cost by around Rs. 300 crore” since it began changing its distribution strategy. Malik also projected a saving of “Rs. 3200 crore in five years”.
Travelport has seen a rapid expansion in India in recent years and now has an extensive agency partner network in the country. This includes major online travel agencies such as MakeMyTrip, Ibibo, Yatra, EaseMyTrip and ClearTrip, as well as major corporate travel agencies and newer entrants to the travel sector such as PayTM. In addition to industry-leading airline content, Travelport has a significant footprint with leading hotel groups and aggregators in India such as Oberoi, Taj, Treebo and Trident.
