Amadeus and the Spanish Tourism Institute (Turespaña), which falls under the Spanish Ministry of Industry, Energy and Tourism and is responsible for the international promotion of Spain as a tourist destination, have signed a technology agreement under which the state-run Institute will have access to the ForwardKeys technology platform, allowing it to create a Tourism Observatory. Amadeus has also extended its global content agreement with FCm Travel Solutions for another five years.
The new technology agreement will allow Turespaña to perform qualitative and quantitative analyses of traveller flows to ensure optimal promotion of Spain as a tourist destination.
ForwardKeys.com is a business intelligence tool launched in November 2010 by Forward Data, an independent market research and consultancy company, in partnership with Amadeus. The platform aggregates air booking data supplied by Amadeus and other global distribution systems and allows tourist boards to analyse and anticipate trends in terms of the passengers’ chosen destinations, as well as forecasting future tourist occupancy rates and lengths of stay.
“We are certain that Amadeus is the technology partner we needed to launch our Tourism Observatory project, which is one of this Department’s priorities,” said Ignacio Valle Muñoz, General Secretary of Turespaña. This project will allow for greater efficiencies in our promotion of Spain as an international tourist destination.”
Svend Leirvaag, Vice President, Industry Affairs, Amadeus, added: “Specific tourism-related information and data have become an indispensable tool for organisations in the travel and tourism sector. These technologies allow for the anticipation of trends: what kind of tourists are coming at present, what kind will come in the future and which other destinations they are considering.
“Once again, Amadeus, in close collaboration with the travel sector, is providing its sector experience and cutting edge technology for smart data handling and management. It is a privilege for us to be able to use our technology to help make the sector more competitive.”
FCm Global Content Agreement
Meanwhile, Amadeus and FCm Travel Solutions have strengthened their partnership by renewing their global content agreement for a further five years. Under this agreement, Amadeus content will continue to be available to FCm’s partner network via Amadeus Selling Platform and the Amadeus e-Travel Management booking tool.
Gregory Lording, Global Brand Leader at FCm Travel Solutions, said: “Amadeus’s global expertise in distribution, IT and support is highly regarded. We look forward to working closely with Amadeus to ensure our global business achieves more consistency across its IT processes.”
Stephane Durand, Director, Online & Leisure at Amadeus, added: “This extended agreement will reinforce Amadeus’s relationship with FCm. FCm will benefit from Amadeus’s industry-leading booking and IT solutions, while gaining comprehensive, global support via our centralised commercial and IT account managers. FCm’s extended relationship with Amadeus will open up new opportunities to grow further into IT developments in the near future.”
In support of its ongoing relationship with FCm, Amadeus was one of the major sponsors for FCm’s global conference FCm Focus. During the conference FCm launched the extended agreement with Amadeus to its partner network.
