Korean Air and TOPAS partner with Amadeus to power the future of the Korean travel industry | Press Release

 

• Korean Air announces it will migrate to the full suite of Amadeus’ Alt‚a Customer Management Solution, including Reservation, Inventory and Departure Control

 

• Korean Air’s subsidiary TOPAS selects Amadeus as the platform for its next generation travel agency reservation system in Korea

 

Madrid, Spain, 23 May 2011: Korean Air, South Korea’s flagship airline, and Amadeus, a leading transaction processor and provider of advanced technology solutions for the global travel and tourism industry, today announced a partnership that will power the future of the Korean travel industry. Korean Air will transform its passenger service systems by migrating to the full suite of Amadeus’ Alt‚a Customer Management Solution.
Furthermore, Korean Air’s subsidiary TOPAS, Korea’s leading travel information system provider, has selected Amadeus as the platform for its next generation travel agency reservation system.

 

Korean Air and Amadeus are joint shareholders of TOPAS but this is the first time that Amadeus technology will be widely introduced to the Korean travel industry. Together, the partners bring Amadeus’ leadership in the region to a completely new level.

 

A spokesperson for Korean Air said, “Korean Air and Amadeus have a long-standing relationship. We're confident this will help us continue to deliver an advanced level of customer service for our passengers and also integrate more closely with our partners in the Skyteam global alliance. We anticipate more seamless reservation processes, reduction in check-in times, the roll out of new technology options and more personalised flight services for Korean Air customers.

 

“This migration is in line with previous investments, such as introducing next-generation aircraft and establishing enterprise resource planning systems, in order to become a leading global carrier. With Amadeus’ new generation technology, Korean Air will elevate its premium service to the very highest standards,” said Korean Air.
Amadeus’ Alt‚a Customer Management Solution has been selected by 110 of the world’s top airlines including Air France/KLM, Cathay Pacific, Lufthansa, British Airways and Qantas. Once migration is complete, Alt‚a will be in place at all Korean Air offices and airports globally, and will manage all passenger processes for the airline, including reservations, inventory and departure control.

 

Mr Park MooHwa, CEO of Topas said, “At TOPAS we look forward to launching our next generation reservation system based on the Amadeus Selling Platform and GDS customised for the Korean market, which will increase efficiency for travel agents as well as providing new content options and therefore more sales opportunities.“
Amadeus Selling Platform is the world's most utilised retailing application for travel professionals, with almost 90,000 travel agency points of sale globally. The system offers content from more than 440 airlines, over 90,000 hotels and other travel suppliers including cruise, rail, insurance and car hire.

 

Amadeus and TOPAS will invest in customising their technology for the needs of the Korean market to create a system that combines the best processes of its current system with the enhanced functionality and content of the Amadeus Selling Platform.

 

According to Philippe Ch‚rèque, EVP, Commercial, Amadeus is very pleased to extend its partnership with Korean Air and TOPAS.
“Amadeus has worked closely with Korean Air for many years, selling its flight content through our GDS to travel agents worldwide, and we have been a joint venture partner with TOPAS for more than 12 years,” said Philippe. “Today we are delighted to take this partnership, and our leadership in the region, to a completely new level, providing our technology expertise to manage Korean Air’s passenger processes, as well as our GDS platform to process all of TOPAS’ agency bookings. The TOPAS migration to the

 

Amadeus GDS will mean that Amadeus will handle more than 50% of all travel agency bookings in Korea, allowing Amadeus to work with the vast majority of Korean travel agencies.”

 

Ch‚rèque continued, “Amadeus is happy to have been selected by Korean Air, one of the largest Asian carriers, and we are proud to become a key player in the large growing market that Korea represents ”.

 

- ENDS -

 

 

Amadeus is a leading transaction processor and provider of advanced technology solutions for the global travel and tourism industry.

 

Customer groups include travel providers (e.g. airlines, hotels, rail, ferries, etc.), travel sellers (travel agencies and websites), and travel buyers (corporations and individual travellers).

 

The group operates a transaction-based business model and processed more than 850 million billable travel transactions in 2010.

 

Amadeus has central sites in Madrid (corporate headquarters and marketing), Nice (development) and Erding (operations – data processing centre) and regional offices in Miami, Buenos Aires, Bangkok and Dubai. At a market level, Amadeus maintains customer operations through 73 local Amadeus Commercial Organisations covering 195 countries.

 

Amadeus is listed on the Madrid, Barcelona, Bilbao and Valencia stock exchanges and trades under the symbol “AMS.MC”. For the year ended December 31 2010, the company reported revenues of €2,683 million and EBITDA of €1,015 million. The Amadeus group employs over 10,130 people worldwide, with 123 nationalities represented at the central offices.

 

To find out more about Amadeus please visit www.amadeus.com

 

To visit the Amadeus Investor Relations centre please www.investors.amadeus.com

 

 

Korean Air, with a fleet of 133 aircraft, is one of the world's top 20 airlines, and operates almost 400 flights per day to 112 cities in 39 countries. It is a founding member of the Sky Team alliance, together with its 13 members, which offers its 395 million annual passengers a worldwide system of more than 13,000 daily flights covering 898 destinations in 169 countries.

 

In 2010, Business Traveler named Korean Air the best Asian airline for the fourth consecutive year and best transpacific business class for the fifth straight year, while Global Traveler awarded the airline with best business class seat design and best airport staff/gate agent. The carrier won the 2010 global travel catering distinction award by Pax International magazine while World Traveler magazine rated it as having the world’s best in-flight service. Travel & Leisure magazine readers say it is one of the world’s top 10 international airlines and readers of Conde Nast Traveler magazine voted Korean Air one of the world’s top ten global airlines.

 

More on Korean Air's programs, routes, frequency and partners is available at www.koreanair.com

 

 

TOPAS is Korea’s leading travel information system provider that was founded through the capital infusion of Korean Air and Amadeus, the leading airline and travel IT companies in the world, respectively.

 

TOPAS was established to manage Korea’s first CRS (Computer Reservation System) and has achieved high profitability and a stable financial structure. The company also introduced a back office system for travel agencies (Value Office Pro), a Web browser terminal program for travel agencies (TOPASRO2), and an online reservation system (Cyberplus) for the travel market in Korea. It was also selected as the No.1 Company by New Industry Management Academy. As such, despite its small size, TOPAS is a solid company. It continually gives PC donations, scholarship support grants, etc. to return its profits to society. To find out more about TOPAS please visit www.topas.net

 

 

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