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As the next step in its continuing support for Qantas’ New Distribution Capability, including the Qantas Distribution Platform (QDP), Travelport, a leading technology company serving the travel industry, has made its first API-connection bookings for Qantas using IATA’s New Distribution Capability (NDC) standard. The bookings are being made in a live production test environment as Qantas prepares distribution of differentiated NDC content.

This is the first live production Qantas NDC booking through Trip Services, Travelport’s new API. Travelport’s agency partners taking part in the testing program, including ATPI and Maxim’s Travel have been successfully coding to the Trip Services API since early in Q3 and Q2 2019 respectively. The development is the next step in Qantas’ plans for the QDP which is dedicated to offering an improved customer experience by enhancing the airline’s retailing, booking and servicing capabilities and delivering enhanced personalized content tailored to meet a travelers’ unique needs.

Having been the first GDS to make a live NDC booking in October 2018, Travelport has already connected to five airlines’ NDC content. Early adopter test agencies have made live bookings through Travelport’s desktop solution, Smartpoint, as part of a phased roll out over the last year.

Jason Clarke, Chief Commerical Officer – Travel Partners at Travelport commented: “We know our customers need to be able to consume content regardless of its source. It’s exciting to see Trip Services processing live API bookings for customers as the next step in the ongoing delivery of our multi-source content roadmap. NDC delivery is complex and requires collaboration from all parts of the travel industry and we are grateful to our test agencies for partnering with us to ensure we deliver an NDC solution which makes the process of buying and managing travel continually better for everyone.”

The airline industry has been developing NDC since 2012 with the aim of extending customisation to agents and establishing closer relationships between airlines and customers. Travelport already offers Rich Content and Branding, now used by over 270 airlines, including Qantas, and currently distributing over 340 ancillaries for 90 carriers.