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Transforming the border experience: Amadeus acquires WCC's HERMES to elevate end-to-end travel

April 30, 2025
5 min read
Asian woman with suitcase going through airport
Rudy Daniello
Rudy Daniello
Executive Vice President, AirOps, Amadeus
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At Amadeus, we are transforming how travel works,connecting the dots at every stage of the journey to deliver a more seamless, efficient and traveler-centric experience. From search to booking, to airport check-in, boarding and beyond, to getting your rental car and your hotel room – our mission is to remove friction at every touchpoint. Yet one critical part of the journey has often remained disconnected - border control.

With billions of people crossing borders every year, the entry and exit process remains one of the most defining – and potentially disruptive – moments in the traveler journey. Now, Amadeus has taken yet another step to streamline and enhance this experience, by the acquisition of WCC's HERMES solution and business to complement our portfolio and extend our customer base.

Enabling smarter and faster border crossings

HERMES brings sophisticated capabilities in real-time travel data analysis. Integrating and processing passenger information, the solution offers the ability to assess passenger data pre-arrival - streamlining the process and creating better passenger flow.

For travelers, this means shorter queues and faster border crossings, whereas airports and border authorities benefit from more efficient processing and stronger security, all while reducing manual, error-prone checks.


A trusted partnership evolves

WCC HERMES and Amadeus are no strangers to each other. We build on a longstanding and successful partnership, where we have often collaborated and combined capabilities to deliver integrated border management solutions worldwide. The integration of HERMES into the Amadeus portfolio is a natural evolution of that partnership—and a strategic leap forward.

Combined with our existing biometric technologies, including e-Gates, self-service kiosks and facial recognition, this add-on enables us to offer a truly end-to-end border and identity management solution, from home to destination, enhancing the overall traveler experience even further.

Beyond aviation: a unified interoperable border ecosystem

While the airport remains a critical hub for identity and security processes, border management does not end there. The addition of HERMES strengthens our ability to support other transport modalities as well - bringing the same efficiency and intelligence everywhere.

Whether it’s a land crossing, seaport or other entry point, the ability to assess passenger data pre-arrival unlocks new possibilities to enhance passenger flow and improve operational efficiency, wherever people cross borders.


Powering the future

With our focus on connecting the dots in the industry to deliver frictionless travel, this acquisition marks a significant milestone that unlocks new opportunities for the future. Having the HERMES solution and its 20 solution matter experts behind it as an integrated part of our Amadeus is giving us the ability to innovate even faster and deliver even more value to all stakeholders.

As we continue to build toward a smarter, more connected travel ecosystem, we’re not just adding capabilities, we’re transforming how the world experiences travel.

That is connecting the dots in practice – and we’re just getting started.


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