Last Friday, while the Republicans and Democrats were hashing out the debt crisis in Washington, a quiet announcement was made in Dallas that AA and Travelport had come to a truce.
By definition, a truce is not full resolution of the battle, but at least Apollo, Galileo and Worldspan agencies will have a few more months to determine their multi-channel strategy.
GDS-owner Travelport and American issued a joint statement Friday announcing: “The existing full content agreements between American and Travelport’s global distribution systems Apollo, Galileo and Worldspan have been extended concurrently and are no longer due to expire in 2011. [The] terms of Travelport’s subscriber opt-in program for American remain unchanged.”
Since last fall, American has been involved in several lawsuits between the carrier and two major GDSs, Sabre Holdings and Travelport, which owns Orbitz. American’s original action led to a widespread view that other carriers would follow suit in attempting to cut GDS distribution costs.
The anti-trust case is still active and the Justice Department is investigating as we speak.
American’s agreement with Sabre is set to expire in just 28 days and it remains to be see whether there will be truce or out and out war declared on that day.
Stay tuned.