In the airline distribution segment in China, a lot of progress has been made with the support of the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) and IATA.
Is the regulatory environment too listless for any travel intermediary to make any meaningful foray into China? Let us analyze how a technology company such as Amadeus is gearing up for China.
NB: This article is written by Ritesh Gupta, a reporter at TravelDaily China.
Foreign GDS have contemplated an answer to this conundrum over the years, as the travel industry has anticipated when the CAAC would open up this segment of the market.
Until 2012, China was a closed market to all foreign GDS. But all of this is changing with partial deregulation, with the CAAC deciding to pave way for foreign GDS to handle bookings for foreign airlines flying into and from China.
Assessing the situation, Bart Tompkins, managing director - Greater China, Amadeus says that with the gradual deregulation of the market, sophisticated technology developed by foreign GDSs "will soon prove highly beneficial for the travel industry in China".
It should be noted that TravelSky, as a specialist in air ticket distribution and accounting, settlement and clearing in China, too, is making diligent moves to strengthen its position.
Only over 20 million segments on international carriers each year are available for international GDSs to compete as Chinese carriers are still taking the majority share of outbound air travel and TravelSky holds the monopoly in that segment.
They are also taking a big share in the distribution mix in mainland China for international carriers as they have been striving to build the direct connect with international carriers over the years according to a source.
As for the Chinese commercial airlines, the cumulative flight bookings figure last year was around 366 million, with the CAGR for the last couple of years being around 10%, according to the CAAC. Chinese airlines carried 26.55 million passengers on international routes last year, and majority of these were processed by TravelSky.
In 2013, there were more than 620 million transactions and more than 265 million BSP tickets processed by the accounting, settlement and clearing system of ACCA, a subsidiary of TravelSky.
Current status
Lufthansa, KLM, Air France were among the first international airlines to obtain approval for travel agencies to book via Amadeus in China, with many other Asian and European airlines expected to follow suit.
As explained by Tompkins, this means that for the first time, these authorized airlines will be able to book and eventually ticket, via Amadeus, through a pre-selected group of travel agencies in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. He says:
"While progress has been gradual, we are making headway. We gained CAAC approval in January 2014, allowing authorized international airlines bookings via Amadeus in China."
In July this year, the company gained BSP certification approval from IATA for mainland China, which means that it is one step closer to giving authorized travel agents the ability to fulfill the entire billing and ticketing process of travel products offered by foreign BSP airlines.
But, as a senior executive says, the industry is diligently trying to work out apt reporting and remittances, and electronic ticketing, billing and collection.
Printing the official invoice or itinerary accredited by the Chinese tax authority is still an ongoing process for Amadeus. In fact, Etihad Airways and Abacus have announced that they are set to print the first BSP ticket, an indication that the industry is gearing up to adopt the IATA-approved ticketing system.
Sustained effort
Tompkins points out that agents haven’t largely been exposed to the distribution technology that Amadeus has to offer.
For their part, GDS companies are also looking to embrace local options that can help agents to service travellers better. For instance, Amadeus has a strategic collaboration with Alipay, Chinese online payment service provider, to integrate into the Amadeus Payment Platform (APP). This collaboration will make it easier for Amadeus’ travel providers to serve Chinese travellers by offering them the option to pay with Alipay’s online payment system.
One source believes travel agents in China have to evolve at an unprecedented rate to manage the explosion in outbound travel. He says:
"It necessitates greater automation, with the latest productivity tools.
"China’s travel agents each have different business models, so the solutions must work in many different commercial settings."
Amadeus has expanded its teams in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. Abacus, which also secured IATA BSP certification for China earlier this year, has set up six offices across China to understand and cater to regional differences.
The team also acknowledges that localization is always an ongoing process in a market of this scale.
Overall, GDS companies have worked hard to align with China’s travel agents’ practices and protocols with a system that complements their own universal distribution platform. Much of it is about knowledge exchange and best practice.
Many travel agents in China are attracted to the idea of connecting with their counterparts overseas on a common GDS. A growing number of their customers are also interested to explore the foreign aviation brands as part of the experience of travelling internationally.
Tompkins says there is a completely localized interface in place and it is offered in Chinese language.
"We also connect many travel agencies to our extensive range of content, via an API connection.
"This means, we adapt to and connect with their in-house systems to ensure they can benefit from Amadeus’ full range of content, while using their preferred front end tool. This could also be done with third party solutions on request."
Also, there are low fare search tools, available for both the online and offline segment and hotel content is integrated with the Amadeus Selling Platform with more payment methods needed by Chinese travel agencies. Tompkins says:
"A lot of the hotel information of aggregators’ content is in Chinese language."
Also, it would be important for Amadeus to focus its efforts on merchandising for airlines in China.
It would be interesting to assess how GDS companies take note of existing preferences of airlines in China. As witnessed generally, airlines tend to go for both industry standard processes using ATPCO OC and EMD for fulfillment while some also use using XML- based direct connect solutions for accessing and selling ancillaries.
One needs to assess how Chinese airlines’ integrate their merchandizing engines with the indirect channels, and how they make the most of NDC, an IATA-led collaborative initiative aimed at working out a messaging standard between airlines and agencies.
Competition
As for how foreign GDSs can make inroads in the initial stages, a source says they would surely help carriers in China to expand their global footprint.
"As the Chinese carriers have been operating more flights to overseas destinations, their growing needs for overseas distribution should push them to develop further distribution partnership with international GDS companies" .
He further adds that the agencies don’t need to cooperate with foreign GDSs if they only deal with domestic ticketing business.
"But those doing international business can benefit from the partnership with foreign GDSs.
"Agents who have any sort of partnership with foreign GDSs can see the benefit of data consistency if they can use the same GDS in China to serve the corporate clients.
Also, each GDS has its own unique partnerships with different airlines, giving it an advantage over other GDSs when it comes to inventory and the availability of lower fare."
Foreign GDS still have a long way to go. It remains to be seen how foreign GDSs can play their part in helping agents in managing complex itineraries with fare guarantees, re-issue tickets etc. Fees too will be a battle, with TravelSky already indicating that it has an upper hand at least for now.
Tompkins admits there is a lot of paperwork required to operate in China. At the same time, the processes are actually reasonably straightforward and are very manageable.
"We appreciate the CAAC’s efforts in processing airline applications, and we plan to be able to issue tickets for mainland China by October this year."
NB: This article is written by Ritesh Gupta, reporter at TravelDaily China. It appears here as part of Tnooz’s sponsored content initiative.
NB2: Bart Tompkins, managing director - Greater China, Amadeus, is scheduled to speak at the upcoming TravelDaily Conference scheduled for September 3-4, Shanghai.
NB3:Beijing image via Shutterstock.