CTM points to agile regional development philosophy that pushes innovations from four technology hubs in the U.S., U.K. Australia and Hong Kong as benefitting customers. The company claims to address local market requirements in its booking tool faster than any other travel management company, supported by proven technology “deeply ingrained” in an end-to-end travel tech stack.
Regarding specific innovations, the company highlighted how it has expanded Lightning to incorporate a full travel workflow alongside proprietary tools including CTM Risk Alerts, CTM Data Hub and CTM Climate+. The company promoted “a more fluid, cohesive operating system for global business travel that standalone booking tools cannot match.
The company also pointed to Lightning’s sustainable travel features: enabling users to set, monitor and redeem carbon budgets at company, division, team and individual levels and offering a “real-time carbon budget health bar [that] shows carbon cost of each travel option, with the greenest choices highlighted in searches.” The company also said it was working with clients to build carbon costs into approval systems and share carbon budgets between travelers.
Air: Global distribution system, low-cost carrier and New Distribution Capability deliver content from more than 400 airlines globally and is filtered by company policy. CTM offers negotiated fares up to 45 percent off published rates. Client-specific rates and routes are available through Sabre. CTM integrated RouteHappy content with the tool in 2020 to deliver granular service information.
Accommodation: Sabre GDS provides more than 32,000 hotels available as standard along with associated client-negotiated rates. CTM Hotel Program offers discounted rates with a million properties in 149 countries and more than 6,000 cities, plus a comprehensive range of preferred rates. CTM has integrated Conferma for extra content and payment options. It also offers online travel agency content through Expedia Partner Solutions with Booking.com content from more than 60,000 properties in more than 25,000 markets worldwide. Lightning has direct APIs with, eg, Premier Inn/Travelodge.
Rail: Rail content is provided through a variety of sources regionally. In the U.K., domestic rail content is provided by Evolvi. European content is provided by International Rail. CTM has recently introduced comparison capabilities on flights versus domestic and European rail carbon costs.
Car: Preferred partnership agreements with global car rental providers including Sixt, Avis, Enterprise, Hertz and Europcar among others.
NDC & Direct Connect: CTM is Level 4 certified for IATA’s NDC program and is live in Lightning with NDC content from a range of carriers, including Singapore Airlines, Qantas, British Airways and Lufthansa. The tool is in NDC development stages with American Airlines and United Airlines and is working with multiple major carriers as they develop their NDC strategies. CTM sits on IATA’s global travel management executive council advising on future strategic direction and adoption of NDC across the travel supply chain.