GetThere launches tools for collaboration
By Susan Avery -- Purchasing, 11/19/2009 2:00:00 AM
GetThere has launched a new suite of collaboration tools for businesses and travel management companies (TMCs) that helps maximize return on investment (ROI) on travel and virtual meetings services.
GetThere unveiled the suite to more than 100 travel managers, procurement professionals and TMCs attending its European customer summit in London recently.
The tools help companies manage travel and other ways employees meet and collaborate such as web, audio and video conferencing—and social networking. GetThere, which is a Sabre Travel Network business, developed the suite with Sabre Research, part of Sabre's CIO organization.
GetThere's collaboration suite is made up of four components or phases. The first consists of GetThere's core product, its online booking tool, along with its meetings tool, and social networking for sharing travel-related information and hotel reviews.
The second component consists of activities focused on building innovative new tools and services to manage collaboration, including an early prototype return on invested collaboration (ROIC) calculator for travel and meetings and a virtual meetings distribution system.
The third component consists of opportunity for partnerships with companies that offer collaboration tools that fit with others in the suite.
The fourth component integrates all the other components for TMCs and hotel suppliers. As such, a TMC can provide business travelers with alternatives to travel such as videoconferencing or social networking. Hotel suppliers provide help with managing inventory of available videoconferencing rooms.
The thinking behind the early prototype ROIC calculator is that there are factors a company considers when determining whether an employee travels to collaborate with others, says Suzanne Neufang, chief marketing officer at GetThere in Southlake, Texas. These factors consist of trip purpose, revenue generated, cost savings realized, price and others. The calculator is configurable; the company sets weighting associated with each factor and scores which indicate whether the traveler may book the trip.
"Another key value is that data can be captured, which means that travel buyers can survey travelers once they've completed a trip to determine its effectiveness and whether it met the traveler's goals," says Neufang. "In another economic downturn, perhaps CFOs won't resort to such Draconian measures as turning off all travel since some travel really is revenue generating and helps businesses meet their goals."
GetThere showed a prototype at the customer meeting. Neufang says the company plans to spend the next few months testing the tool and soliciting input from customers before introducing it in the second half of 2010.
The first component or phase—the online booking and meetings tools and the social networking—will be available by the end of this year, with the company adding the hotel reviews in 2010. It plans to make available other phases—virtual meetings distribution and enabling partnerships—also in 2010.
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