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ITMCs slow to sign large cos.

Article Excerpt
Internet-originating travel management companies Expedia Corporate Travel, Travelocity Business and Orbitz for Business--despite rocking the managed travel market with their base transaction price of $5 about five years ago--have landed few large clients even after competing for that business by developing tools that support complex corporate travel programs and establishing a physical presence in some key markets.

Some observers speculate that customer care concerns, whether valid or not, have impeded acceptance of such tools by larger-volume buyers. Others suggest that those organizations, because they are larger, take longer to be able to embrace new technology and that the handful of CT100 companies now using such companies on a partial basis are just the beginning.

While Internet-originating travel management companies certainly prompted legacy TMCs to lower transaction costs and upgrade their use of technology, some traditional travel management companies claimed they still are not seeing ITMCs competing for corporate tender offers. Meanwhile, online travel management companies improved on early technological tools that at first lacked such capabilities as policy enforcement, reporting and profile synchronization.

"It's taken several years and several versions for them to catch...

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