Carnival Cruise Lines’ new Carnival Dream will introduce the FunHub, a shipboard intranet portal featuring an onboard social network and access to information on the ship’s services, facilities and daily activities. The 130,000-ton vessel, Carnival’s largest ship, is set to debut Sept. 21.
Travelport has entered into a strategic relationship with PSP International to form a joint venture company to provide integrated payment solutions tailored specifically for the travel industry. The joint venture, in which Travelport holds a majority stake, was completed on June 24, 2009.
Ticketmaster and Priceline have announced a partnership that establishes priceline.com as the Official Partner of Ticketmaster.com. Under the terms of the new alliance, consumers using Ticketmaster.com will gain access to priceline.com’s travel services, including specially tailored hotel, airline, and rental car offers to accompany their live event ticket purchases.
Expedia.com launched a new interactive “Drive Getaway” ideas tool, developed in partnership with TripAdvisor, the world’s largest travel community. The Drive Getaway tool provides users with ideas for driving-distance trips accessible from their starting city on a single tank of gas or less.
Bob Diener and David Litman, the founders of Hotels.com and pioneers of the online hotel industry, have launched www.getaroom.com. The new company said that with money-saving non-published rates, travelers booking accommodations with getaroom.com get the benefits of opaque pricing without being kept in the dark about where they will be sleeping.
Thomson Holidays is to launch a personal pre-departure website for online customers at the end of the summer. Named MyThomson, the site’s aim is to enhance customer’s pre-departure experience by providing all their holiday details and information in one place.