Sabre Unveils Flexible New GDS Platform

The chief architect of Sabre’s new platform says the company had a vision of something “big” and “innovative” when it began developing a reservations system that for the first time will enable complex a la carte pricing.

The new platform, known as SabreSonic CSS (for customer sales and service), employs an open systems-based revenue management architecture that will support multiple distribution channels.

Sabre unveiled the new system last week, jumping to the lead in the ongoing race among the major GDS providers, Sabre, Amadeus and Travelport, to develop more versatile distribution tools for the airlines.

While the GDSs will continue to rely on dependable and fast legacy mainframe technology for raw computing power, the new systems will provide a Web interface and open systems architecture. That design will enable software developers and others to build on the foundations of the new platform and participate in its evolution.

The systems will be released in modules over the coming months, which will enable airline partners to set priorities on the types of ancillary service offerings they want to develop and to decide how they want to integrate them.

Jim Barlow, a lead designer of Sabre’s new platform, said part of what programmers wanted to build into the complex platform was a “customer-centric focus” that would enable airlines to be more sensitive to consumers’ needs, desires or concerns and to respond more quickly to them.

Data already exist in the passenger name record, or PNR, which is compiled from an individual’s flight history and might also include detailed profile information added by travel agencies. SabreSonic CSS will help compile and sort that data, giving airline partners that use the new technology more information about customers.

Purchasing habits, travel history and other pertinent data could aid airline websites, call centers and travel agents in up-sell opportunities and help make them more efficient in preparing a traveler’s trip with regard to seating choices and amenities.

The guts of the new technology, in which Sabre’s private owners have invested an undisclosed but sizeable sum, are the revenue management tools for which airlines have been asking, so they can unbundle costs of services at the point of sale and assign those costs to customers based on their preferred level of service.