Updates from IATA, iCarsClub, TaxiMonger, Hertz, Rental Tonight, AirAsia, Celebrity Cruises, American Airlines, Orbitz partner network, Finnair, Pan Pacific Hotels, PassKey, Sarova Hotels, RateTiger and Hotels.com makes to our travel technology news scan for March 13.
Regulatory moves:
This week the International Air Transport Association (IATA) filed Resolution 787 with the US Department of Transportation (DOT), seeking "approval of a process for developing an electronic data interchange standard for airline distribution communications" that essentially replaces the current language, EDIFACT, with Extensible Markup Language (XML).
XML would allow many things, including a move to a New Distribution Capability (NDC) which Tnooz has covered before. IATA is required to file all resolutions and agreements coming out of its various conferences with the DOT. The for-profit Business Travel Coalition opposes approval for a variety of reasons. But it's hard to see how the DOT would say no to the language change, given that IATA probably already holds the authority to proceed with the development of this language standard under an previously approved resolution. A decision is due in April.
IATA will have to seek DOT approval to put the NDC into actual force. It is now saying the first NDC trial will happen in April, with a request to the DOT for approval to come later in the year. Meanwhile, popular aviation blogger Brett Snyder is having "airline distribution week" on his Cranky Flier blog.
Meanwhile, IATA has defended the NDC in the pages of the New York Times, in response to the paper's assault on it last week.
Car Rental:
iCarsClub, the Singapore-based peer to peer car rental startup has secured US$ 482,000 in funding from Red Dot Ventures, a Singapore-based incubator. The company was founded in 2012 with a focus on monetising the idle time of private cars. The investment will be used for expansion into other countries in Asia. Since majority of the founding team is from China, it;s expected that the next service extension will be in to major cities in the country. iCarsClub uses a proprietary technology called iCarbox. The vehicle's locking system will be integrated with iCarbox, which in turn is connected to iCarsClub's central server systems. The central server controls the locking/unlocking of the car's door through iCarbox technology.
TaxiMonger, Malaysia-based taxi booking and review portal has launched a pilot projet with AirAsia. As part of the project, users who book a taxi through AirAsia's Chrome app (upon purchasing a flight) will be eligible to win a ride to LCCT (Low Cost Carrier Terminal in Kuala Lumpur) in a luxurious car.
Hertz has made available its Supercars in Europe to cater for international and local market demand. Hertz Supercars are now available for rental in France, Italy and, as of April, in the Netherlands.
Rental Tonight, the newest global car rental portal aiming at same day business has officially launched.
Airlines:
AirAsia's plan to venture into India through a partnership with Tata has taken another step. AirAsia formally registered the name of its Indian affiliate, AirAsia (India) Private Limited, with India's Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA). In India, registering the name is mandatory before incorporating the company. AirAsia will own 49%, Tatas will own 30%, and the rest will be owned by Arun Bhatia of Telestra Tradeplace.
Celebrity Cruises has launched a refreshed air travel service, Celebrity's ChoiceAir. This launch with mark the cruise industry's first lowest airfare guarantee. The site promises to find the lowest fares on available flights, also guarantees that if Celebrity doesn't find the lowest fare, the guest will be compensated.
American Airlines plans to give its flight attendants the Samsung Galaxy Note 2, rather than iPad Minis. This is notable given that the carrier has equipped its pilots with iPads.
Orbitz Partner Network has signed a deal with Finnair to power dynamic package search and booking capabilities on the company's U.S. website.
Hotels:
Pan Pacific Hotels Group, Singapore-based hotelier has adopted Passkey's cloud-based GroupMAX hotel booking technology across key properties in Singapore and Australia. This initiative will support the growing demands of its group and meetings clientele. With GroupMAX adoption, Pan Pacific Hotels will be able to automate its group reservations process, offer a wide range of room upgrade options, extended stays and other hotel amenities to MICE groups.
The Sarova Hotel Group is upgrading its centralized hotel distribution to process all third party channel updates via MICROS Opera, utilizing the RateTiger enterprise connectivity solution. The fully integrated, two-way connectivity solution will enable Sarova Hotel Group to update distribution data (rate, inventory, availability etc) real-time and receive reservations directly into its PMS.
OTAs:
Hotels.com has launched two new apps for Windows 8, one designed for mobile and another built specifically for Windows 8 tablet.