BizAway partners with Duffel to broaden flight coverage and enhance its retailing experience
Bizaway integrates quickly with Duffel to access dozens of NDC airlines, avoid the GDS surcharges, and get the cheapest available fares.
BizAway, the all-in-one solution to manage your business trips, was founded in January 2015 by Luca Carlucci and Flavio Del Bianco. In a globalised world where more people travel for work, there was still a lack of comprehensive services that facilitated business travel in an agile and flexible way. Using a proprietary software tool, Luca and Flavio combined their passion for travel and technology to bring real value to companies through the launch of BizAway.
BizAway was growing its business successfully but needed a long-term partner for flight content. It was concerned about Global Distribution System (GDS) surcharges recently implemented by Avianca, Emirates, and Singapore Airlines, and the legacy systems that make building distribution APIs and managing customer service a challenge.
So, BizAway started its search for a forward-thinking technology partner, built using New Distribution Capability (NDC), and able to enhance its retailing experience to serve its customers better.
During their search, BizAway started conversations with Duffel about the challenges of selling flights and how Duffel’s Flights API and related tools could help. It was quickly clear that working with Duffel would mean a fast integration with powerful APIs, eliminating the risk of GDS surcharges. BizAway could access more than 20 major airlines with just one integration and offer a superior customer experience with the flexibility required.
‘BizAway going live with Duffel in a matter of weeks shows the speed of integration for companies looking to build a better flight booking experience, including access to exclusive content and paid extras. As the travel industry recovers and airlines progress with NDC, we’re seeing more travel sellers like BizAway use Duffel’s tools to access all airline content quickly and grow their businesses faster.’
Steve Domin, co-founder and CEO, Duffel
Fast integration with more airlines
‘The integration with Duffel's API to our multi-vendor technology allows us to take advantage of the NDC standard. Duffel helps us scale fast as we can very quickly activate the next airlines adopting NDC as a new distribution channel.’ explains Flavio Del Bianco, co-founder and CTO of BizAway.
‘We will offer our customers more direct connecting flights, which will translate into faster booking times,’ says Del Bianco. ‘In the same way, our customers will see a reduction in the cost of their flights for the airlines we work with: American Airlines, Austrian Airlines, British Airways, Brussels Airlines, Emirates, Iberia, Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines, Swiss Air and soon several more.’
Comprehensive flight booking and management experience
BizAway prioritises providing a better end-to-end experience for its customers. And with those customer needs continually changing, BizAway needed an adaptable platform partner to plan for the future. Duffel’s suite of APIs cover the full flight experience: search, book, changes and cancellations, paid seats and bags, pay later options, and more. The clear developer documentation and guides made it easy for the BizAway team to add new functionality quickly.
Easy access to hundreds of airlines and new NDC integrations
A clear advantage BizAway found with Duffel was the ability to unlock hundreds of airlines through one API integration, including dozens of NDC airlines. Duffel manages the direct connection with each airline and takes care of any updates, maintenance, or bugs.
After the initial integration, BizAway can immediately choose which airlines they want to access. And when new airlines are available on Duffel, BizAway can activate the carrier themselves or easily requested access to start selling flights straight away.
10% (est.) cheaper flights for customers
BizAway plans to reduce the price of flights by an estimated 10% by working with Duffel compared to traditional industry suppliers. They expect to do this by leveraging the improved retail infrastructure to provide a better customer experience and increase bookings and ancillary sales. This compounds by avoiding the GDS surcharges and passing those savings on to its customers.
A number of airlines are increasingly making their cheapest fares available via NDC. By integrating with Duffel's API, BizAway can now access these specific fare groups and promotional offers pass these to customers.
What’s next for BizAway
‘In a challenging year, we have expanded our business by adding 150 new customers, increasing our team by 32 people and appointing Eduard Ros, Glovo's CFO, as a new advisor to the company, along with obtaining capital injections to the value of 4.5 million euros,’ says Flavio Del Bianco. ‘We are proud to contribute to the growth of the corporate travel sector through innovation and technology, such as the integration of Duffel's API to our platform, and are excited for what’s to come,’ he concludes.
Duffel is also continuing to expand its business by adding new airlines and new capabilities. In the last month, Duffel confirmed airline partnerships with Qatar Airways, LATAM, and Copa Airlines increasing the choice and global network of content available for BizAway to offer back to its customers. Duffel also plans to release features such as flight changes, private fares, and loyalty programmes soon.
Build your own travel solution
Duffel is your complete toolkit for selling flights online. You can get started quickly as an authorised travel seller and access content from hundreds of airlines, including dozens of NDC airlines, using our industry accreditation and airline ticketing authority.
You can also use comprehensive developer documentation, client libraries, and pre-built user interface components to make building great experiences easier for your engineering team.