Blackberry users on mobile trip manager Worldmate will be the first on the system to have their emails automatically scanned for travel bookings.

Worldmate has developed an opt-in tool called TripCatch which monitors email communication so that whenever an email with a travel booking confirmation pops into the inbox the user’s itinerary is automatically updated.

TripCatch will screen for flights, hotels and car hire bookings to add to the user’s existing Worldmate trip planning system.

Worldmate says the system will only add information from an email account once the user is prompted.

The idea is to ease the existing itinerary management process associated with Worldmate and other mobile services such as TripIt by adding an automated element into the system.

Travelport has reached a deal with mobile travel services provider Worldmate, completing the GDS world’s rapidly expanding moves into the mobile world.

Worldmate will provide travel management companies in the US and Canada on the Galileo and Worldspan system a platform for customers to so they can manage itineraries via a handset, receive flight alerts and browse maps.

Users will also be able to share itineraries with colleagues  and business contacts as well as access the LinkedIn system and their own travel consultant.

Travelport says the service will initially be available only on Blackberry devices but there are plans to extend to Worldmate’s existing products on the Apple iPhone and Nokia handsets.

An official says although a number of companies were screened to provide a service, Worldmate’s agreement is not exclusive and the decision to partner with it was “based on features and functionality to meet the needs of our TMCs”.

“We continue to look at multiple companies in the mobile space since the future landscape is still very fluid.”

Travelport’s deal with Worldmate finally puts it alongside rivals Amadeus and Sabre with a major mobile offering for customers, although it will be used initially as a private label system through TMCs.

Indeed, Worldmate stated its aim to work closer with the GDS sector when it shifted its senior management team around in February 2010.

However, Sabre’s Tripcase and the Amadeus app (launched in March 2010) are different in that both GDSs are making a direct play to the consumer market.

Traditional travel management companies slowly are picking their mobile  itinerary-management partners  so, like teens at a prom, it’s starting to become clear who is going with whom to the after-party.

In a two-pronged deal, Carlson Wagonlit Travel signed nonexclusive referral agreements with WorldMate and conTgo.

CWT clients using Blackberrys and iPhones will be able to get synchronized itineraries and flight-related alerts from WorldMate,  and they can also choose to receive itineraries from conTgo’s SMS platform, CWT says.

CWT argues that these mobile-travel assistants help corporations achieve compliance with corporate travel policies.

So, if CWT has opted to use WorldMate and conTgo, here’s at least a partial lineup of other traditional TMC-itinerary management partnerships.

And, the travel management company’s strategy is to give road warriors a choice of which itinerary-management solution they prefer.

• American Express Business Travel is offering platforms from Rearden Commerce and WorldMate. For now, as a precursor to a formal announcement, Amex is being coy about how it will handle the two offerings. Amex spokeswoman Tracy Paurowski says: “With the mobile platform we are offering, we will work with clients to understand their needs and objectives and offer a solution that matches. Geography will be a consideration and capabilities/availability of the services that make up our mobile solution will also factor.”
• Sabre’s TripCase has signed on Omega World Travel, which will give its business and government travelers the option of using the mobile assistant.
• And, TripIt landed one of the first — if not the first — deal with a travel management company last year when it announced a partnership with BCD Travel.

These agreements poentially are huge for WorldMate, conTgo, TripCase and TripIt because a lot of business travelers will be using them as corporate travel bounces back.

American Express Business Travel has teamed with WorldMate to broaden the travel management company’s mobile offerings.

Amex has agreed to integrate WorldMate’s premium services into the TMC’s overall mobile platform for corporate clients and their business travelers, WorldMate says.

The WorldMate integration supplements other itinerary management services which Amex offers through Rearden Commerce.

The WorldMate itinerary services will be available to Amex-connected road warriors on Blackberrys and other mobile devices, WorldMate says.

The fee-based premium services, which WorldMate brands as its Gold membership product, include automatic itinerary synchronization; flight alerts with suggested alternatives, when necessary; the ability to share itineraries with fellow employees, itinerary integration with a mapping and navigation application; and social-networking tools.

The Amex version of the WorldMate premium service also includes one-click access to Amex travel counselors.

There is some overlap between the WorldMate product and other itinerary-management services which Amex offers to its clients through Rearden Commerce.

The Rearden Mobile Personal Assistant, which Amex is offering to its clients regardless of which corporate booking tools they support, syncs itineraries with passenger name records (PNRs), faciliates mobile check-in, and provides travel alerts, dining search and reservations, flight search and weather information.

Corporations apparently are pressuring their TMCs to get onboard with mobile solutions that will enable business travelers to better-manage their trips while adhering to corporate travel policies.

As Amex gets its mobile-platform act together, it apparently is giving corporations an array of choices — including Rearden and WorldMate — for various itinerary services

Thus, slowly, global TMCs are picking mobile-solutions partners.

WorldMate rival, TripIt, revealed a BCD Travel partnership for itinerary services in August 2009.

The really interesting part about mobile travel apps right now is how much investment is going into this space.

And, equally important, how the improved functionality is making a much more compelling value proposition for the end user.

So I ask the question: is it too late for airlines themselves to own a piece of this?

So who are some of the players to watch:

• Worldmate (formerly MobiMate) have been writing mobile travel apps before they were even called by that name. Privately held, the company has investments from Motorola Ventures and the Blackberry Partners Fund. They were based in Israel until key staff announced an intention to relocate to Silicon Valley. Their deal with Virgin Blue is one to watch.
• TripIt recently pulled in a third round of funding from Azure Capital Partners and O’Reilly Alpha Tech Ventures, bringing to$13.1 million the amount taised to date. Sabre was an investor in an earlier round.
• Tripcase from Sabre recently announced Omega World Travel as the first TMC to deploy their app, so this is definitely a trend to watch.
• Mobiata have their FlightTrackPro product, but what makes them even more interesting is their partnership with Farelogix and their intention to work directly with airlines.
• Cornerstone and their ilk. You won’t see them in the B2C space, but they have a lot of the underlying data to offer some compelling apps if they chose, either in their own right or partnering with others.

This is a very competitive space, and the list could be extended to offerings from companies like Traxo, Kayak and more, but I’ve stuck with the ones I am personally watching most closely.

And if you are still not convinced of the potential for mobile apps in travel, take a look at this survey showing the gap between traveller preference and traveller adoption – although somehow I think the mobile disbelievers have disappeared, only to be replaced by the disoriented who are still trying to discover a way to make sense of it all.

They will later to be followed by the disillusioned who will ask why they themselves didn’t do anything with mobile back in 2010!

Improved functionality

As a frequent traveller in both Europe and the Asia Pacific region, the amount of times I’ve been inconvenienced due to last minute flight cancellations or significant delays really has been quite minimal.

And when I have, the airline has typically telephoned or sent an email to warn me. For this reason I was not an early adopter of the mobile itinerary planning apps that touted their real time alerting functionality.

That said, I can definintely see why others, especially those travelling to airports frequently affected by adverse weather conditions, have signed up in their millions. But now, even my resistance has crumbled.

Business social networking really is a powerful way to make travel more productive and more enjoyable, but to date, no technology vendor has really taken full advantage of this.

I remember having lunch with Scott Hintz from Tripit at a CASMA conference in Berlin in October 2007 and we were discussing how some type of partnership with LinkedIn was what they absolutely needed to get traction amongst business travellers.

I was very happy one year later to hear that Tripit were launching the first Linkedin travel application. Business contacts could monitor your travel plans if they were subscribed to email updates from Linkedin.

This was a great start, but there was still a lot of room to make the process work more smoothly.

Tripit have for a long time had the ability to invite people as connections/friends, but this was of limited use up until now as most people would never initiate an entirely new social network (ie. replicate what they already have elsewhere on Linkedin or Facebook) just for a travel site.

I imagine Worldmate learnt a similar lesson after they launched their own social network in May 2008. Both companies now appear to have changed for the better.

One partial way around the problem above of starting a whole new social network is what Tripit have done with their recently launched Groups. It allows people sharing the same company email domain to see where their colleagues are travelling at any point in time.

It still amazes me that more companies don’t make use of this type of functionality, and Tripit are clearly going after a subset of the Cornerstone business called iBank. Many companies are currently paying good money to see where employees are travelling at any point in time, but Tripit will surely be putting some downward pricing pressure on this valuable product.

This model sounds a bit like the early days of Salesforce.com – sales management software was previously sold at the corporate level, but the new entrant sold to individuals who did not want to go through a central procurement office.

The resulting user adoption become so widespread and the users so passionate, that in the end the corporation had no choice but to succumb. Tripit will be hoping for a similar groundswell of mid level manager acceptance to overcome established players like Cornerstone.

The one big disadvantage Tripit will face initially is non compliance in forwarding itinerary emails. Unless someone centrally (maybe the TMC implant in a large company) forces every itinerary email to be BCCed to Tripit, the system will have too many gaps to be truly effective.

Worldmate are also moving forward in a very valuable way by seemingly making even better use of LinkedIn data than Tripit. Rather than getting an email from Linkedin on your contacts and their travel plans, Worldmate incorporates this into the mobile itinerary planner – as they themselves say, even elite travelers eat alone on the road.

Where this becomes really powerful, and Worldmate are not there yet, is when my LinkedIn location is updated regardless of whether I am using Worldmate, Tripit, Tripit Groups, Cornerstone or any other program or supplier, and then this information is matched with the itinerary planner on my smart phone.

Clearly LinkedIn are sitting in the box seat on this one (apart from maybe some large corporations who also wield influence in making this tool valuable) as what is needed is either one central repository on location, or  mobile app creaters who try and assimilate this information from multiple sources.

Using GPS on the phone to track location is too intrusive to get mass adoption, so it will be interesting to watch how it all pans out.

So what about the airlines?

First of all, why even ask about the airlines? Many readers will already know that I’ve been writing on innovation in airline direct sales channels for over a year on my own blog, so whether I am writing about ancillary revenue, social networking, mobile, or any other travel related topic, I always try and come at it from an airline direct angle.

But which airlines am I watching, and why?

So far in this piece, Virgin Blue is the only airline I’ve mentioned by name. The airline’s general manager of marketing, Michelle Lee, was quoted recently talking about mobile, and it appears from the CEO’s comments that the deal was actually done with RIM who probably referred it to Worldmate as part of their investment in the company.

I don’t know Lee personally, but I’ve heard staff at Virgin Blue speak highly of her passion for taking the airline into the forefront of social business.

She has a good quote about Blackberry being chosen as the preferred platform because “we recognise [it] as the preferred device for business customers. Part of our ‘new world’ strategy is we are trying to reposition ourselves as the carrier-of-choice for the business segment.”

Using a mobile app, and possibly even the social networking components within that app, as a way to reposition a former LCC to attract a higher yielding customer is a great way to think about the new opportunities being presented to airlines via mobile technology .

Another point I mentioned earlier was the partnership between Mobiata and Farelogix; the reason this is particularly interesting is because they are also working directly with airlines.

Ben Kazez is the founder of Mobiata and when I was talking to him earlier this week I asked about where he saw the real opportunity in working with airlines: merchandizing was one of the first words he said.

Service recovery was also mentioned (example given of notifying someone about free wifi if their flight is delayed), but he was passionate about the opportunity for selling seat upgrades and lounge access via a mobile app.

On the question of whether an airline could build this for themselves he was quick to emphasise Mobiata’s “code tested with hundereds of thousands of users already” and their UI focus that has resulted in strong user acceptance.

My view on selling ancillaries via an app (just like selling via an airline website) is that the issues of payment and fulfillment are always harder than they first appear.

At every airline conference I atttend there is alway some wide eyed newbie with a great product telling airlines “Just add this to your website and watch the money roll in,” only to be replaced by another wide eyed newbie with another world changing product at the next conference.

If Mobiata were doing this on their own I’d be much more skeptical, but doing it in the way that they are definintely means they need to be taken very seriously.

There are many more airlines doing interesting things in mobile, but today I’ve been focussed writing mainly on the dowloadable apps rather than websites optimized for mobile. In reality, for an airline to own this space in their market, the two should be closely intertwined.

Earlier this month United Airlines announced a mobile website where “customers can view their itineraries and, in the event of missed connections, see the flights on which they have been automatically rebooked, rather than waiting in line at the airport for agent assistance” and Finnair have a great feature where they can send an SMS upgrade offer whereby replying to the message sees points deducted from your frequent flier account – a great way of overcoming payment limitations.

So the opportunities in mobile are much bigger than the app, but this piece could easily double in length if I kept going down this path.

The airlines really have the ability to take mobile to the masses – more and more passengers are buying and installing third party itinerary planning and sharing apps by the day; the more mainstream this movement becomes, the less power the airlines will have in influencing the direction it takes.

It is very difficult to displace a frequently used tool loved by its user, but fortunately for airlines these early adopters, even though they number in the millions, are still only a small percentage of travellers actually owning smart phones.

In short, 2010 really is the year for the airline to get serious about its mobile strategy.

So to wrap up, I move away from the airlines and back to the vendors (my own employer clearly excluded).

With Worldmate and Mobiata chasing the airlines, TripIt chasing the corporations and Tripcase chasing the TMCs, will the rest be left chasing the crumbs?

NB: Martin Collings is employed by Amadeus and for reasons of impartiality has specifically excluded any mention of the Amadeus CheckMyTrip mobile app in this article.

Apple changed the music industry with iTunes. Might smartphone manufacturers like Samsung, Nokia, Motorola and RIM or mobile operating-system providers like Apple, Google or Microsoft disrupt the travel industry by weaving themselves into the fabric of travel distribution?

Mobile trip-management company WorldMate is “deeply involved” with multiple parties “in the mobile landscape” which are seeking to embed travel services from mobile check-in to last-minute travel purchases into their core operating systems, says Chief Commercial Officer Nadav Gur.

Gur says the players include smartphone manufacturers which are looking to travel — and talking with online travel agencies and other distribution parties — as a substantial revenue stream to offset margin pressure on smartphone manufacturing and services.

Gur, who was the founding CEO of Worldmate, says he expects one smartphone manufacturer to launch a deeply integrated travel product this year.

WorldMate, which offers trip-management services and competes against TripIt, TripCase, Kayak Trips and others, claims to have the largest user base in the crowd, although the company is relatively short on brand recognition in North America.

The smartphone players seeking to get involved in travel are not talking about building apps and linking to third parties for trip-planning, but seek to embed travel services and booking off-the shelf into their devices.

With the cash that some of these giant device manufacturers have available, it isn’t inconceivable that they could be looking at acquiring an OTA, with their smaller market caps  – even an Expedia or Priceline — as they seek to shake up the market and move their plans forward.

WorldMate’s role with the smartphone manufacturers or mobile operating-system providers is to provide them with technology expertise and the business acumen necessary to break into the travel industry.

Privately held WorldMate has investments from Motorola Ventures and the Blackberry Partners Fund, but Gur says don’t necessarily use those relationships to read the tea leaves about which mobile partners WorldMate is involved with.

So why would a major smartphone manufacturer, like Apple or Motorola or Nokia, need WorldMate as an entrée into the travel industry?

Gur says having a first-mover advantage might be critical, and perhaps WorldMate might trim six to nine months off the delivery process for its partners.

The last-minute travel arena might be a key focus of some of these mobile players because of the nature of their devices. They can push hotel or car-rental offers to travelers at airports, for instance, especially if there are flight delays or cancellations.

With many people saying that mobile devices may eventually replace the PC as the primary means for browsing the Web and booking travel, perhaps smartphone manufacturers and mobile-operating system providers will play a huge role in changing travel distribution as we know it.

Gur, citing confidentiality agreements, declined to identify WorldMate’s partners in the new mobile-travel push.

Mobile itinerary-management company WorldMate shook up its executive ranks and is making a push for cobranded deals and advertising agreements with airlines, hotels and GDSs, as well as white-label pacts with smartphone manufacturers.

As announced previously, the Palo Alto, Calif., firm will be rolling out a Blackbery app, Virgin Blue by WorldMate, in the first quarter which will enable Virgin Blue passengers to book flights and check-in from their Blackberrys.

A second phase of the implementation will involve deeper integration, including push alerts and opportunities for ancillary revenue such as hotel and limo bookings, says Nadav Gur, WorldMate’s founding CEO, who becomes chief commercial officer in the executive maneuverings.

In addition to the Virgin Blue deal, which involves a revenue-share model, Gur says WorldMate is talking to GDSs about joint solutions, has conversations going with major global airlines, and is “a few days away” from announcing an advertising launch where a major a hotel chain and some airlines will advertise on WorldMate’s Symbian app, an operating system used on Ericcson and Nokia phones.

Rest assured that in WorldMate’s GDS discussions, it probably isn’t having much conversation with Sabre, which has its own itinerary-management app in TripCase.

Among the management changes at WorldMate, Jean Tripier, most previously chief operating officer at mobile-solutions provider Good Technology, becomes WorldMate’s new CEO, and Amir Kirshenboim returns to WorldMate as CEO of WorldMate Israel.

WorldMate says Tripier will head negotiations with “top-level brands” on co-branded distribution deals, which WorldMate argues is becoming a trend as travel companies seek to accelerate rollouts of their mobile offerings.

Tripier says a lot of airlines around the world have been building their own mobile apps for the iPhone, but they are short-changing themselves as many business travelers use Blackberrys and smartphones with the Symbian operating system, for instance.

In addition, an airline’s customers usually have relationships with more than one airline, and WorldMate can provide airline customers access to multiple airlines in these cobranded deals.

Says Gur: “Every airline has a line item to do mobile. Then they figure out that it’s complex” and look for solutions and focus on “how do we make this a profit center instead of a cost center.”

WorldMate says 5 million travelers use its personal assistant and hopes the executive changes will boost global expansion.

WorldMate, which keys in on business travelers with its itinerary management service, claims it has trumped competitor TripIt’s LinkedIn capabilities with the launch of a WorldMate Blackberry app that enables users to find nearby LinkedIn connections or those in other cities.

WorldMate’s new LinkedIn features, available today, are accessible over the Web or through the mobile app, the company says.

The Palo Alto, Calif., company, which claims 5 million users of its personal travel assistant, says its integration with LinkedIn’s API enables users to:

• View nearby LinkedIn connections within their WorldMate itineraries;

• Peruse a mobile pop-up which displays their LinkedIn connections who are in the locale when they arrive; and

• Scan and contact connections in the destination.

The WorldMate website-LinkedIn integration looks like the following:

Among the burgeoning number of itinerary-management services, TripIt pioneered LinkedIn integation as TripIt users can display upcoming getaways and business trips, their current location and travel stats on their LinkedIn profiles. It looks like this:

However, in contrast to WorldMate’s new mobile app for LinkedIn, TripIt’s LinkedIn functionality currently is accesible only through LinkedIn over the Web.