ACCOVIA partner of the 5th edition of "TRAVELD'OR 2013" awarded the prize of best category "Maritime transport" to Costa cruise.

	This year, nearly 175 commercial sites that have been selected to provide a representative sample from 12 categories + 3 special prizes.
		Laurent Briquet, Deputy General Manager of Accovia France, was pleased to award a prize to the best French website in the "Maritime Transport" category...COSTA CRUISE!

As a first step, users were invited to vote for their favorite travel website. They have contributed, through their vote, to establish a list of five finalists per category.

Finally, the jury, composed of experts in their area conducted finalist sites and assigned different prices.

At the end of the ceremony, 12 sites were awarded a prize.

See the photos of this event click HERE

Accovia was partner of the Net Managers 2012, held from 9 to 14 June, in San Francisco and Las Vegas.

Participants discovered the 2012 thema, "Silicon Valley Secrets", through different presentations and activities, such as the Google Headquarters' visit.

Accovia will attend the "XFT Discovery 2012" congress, held from June 7 to 10, in Orange Beach Hotel in Hammamet, Tunisia.

This meeting, organized by Exchange For Travel (XFT), is an opportunity to bring together French tourism professionals to work on roles and orientations of the association, and on the evolution and practical use of XFT language.

The theme of this edition is: "A business-oriented language: towards greater sales and productivity ..."

Net Managers is the first event 100% dedicated to online travel and tourism industry.

Created for French on-line and off-line, tourism professionals and decision makers, Net Managers regroups the largest online Travel Agencies, Network Managers, Tour Operators, Airlines, Hotels, Car Rental Cies,...

This event will be held from June 9 to 14, 2012 in San Francisco and Las Vegas
The edition 2012 thema is: "Silicon Valley Secrets!"

Visit the site (in French) on http://www.netmanagers.fr

Accovia was present at QlikTech's annual Global Partner Summit "Qonnections 2012", held from April 22 to 25 in Miami, USA.

Over 900 partners were in attendance, representing 25% growth of its partners network compared to 2011!

During this conference, QlikTech laid out its themes for its future product release, currently dubbed QlikView.next.

This event was devoted to the presentation of "Hubiz Intelligence", based on QlikView technology.

Participants discovered, through different case studies, this revolutionary approach to business intelligence, called "Business Discovery". It is focused on business users and not on IT departments, in order to simplify data analysis and thus, make quicker and better decisions.

Throughout the presentation, many questions were asked to Philippe Motillon, Director, Hubiz Intelligence. Thank you to all participants for their interest and fruitful exchanges!

If you missed this event, do not hesitate to contact us for more information about Hubiz Intelligence by clicking HERE.

ACCOVIA, TRAVEL d'OR 2012 partner

Accovia were partner of the 4th edition of the "Travel d'Or" ceremony, which was held on March 15 in Paris, France.

During this evening, the best e-tourisme websites, chosen by the Internet users, were rewarded.

Online travel agencies, airline companies...In total, more than 256 commercial websites were analysed between January 25 and February 17.

At the end of the ceremony, 12 websites were rewarded as Air France, EasyJet, Booking.com, Tripadvisor, etc.

Laurent Briquet, Deputy General Manager of Accovia France, was pleased to award a prize to the best French website in the "Tour-Operator" category...FRAM!

Come and visit us during ITB Berlin

Accovia is present Hall 6-1, booth n° 114.

We are waiting for you !

With consumers demanding more options and control over their travel choices, the viability of prepackaged and prepriced travel products is waning. Tour planning, pricing and booking take place in an increasingly dynamic environment where knowledgeable travelers package and manage their own tours via the web, with no travel agent interaction.

Tourism professionals now require greater flexibility from their booking engines so that they can introduce new offers to the market faster and respond to their customers' emerging demand for real-time dynamic packaging.

That's why Accovia developed a new dynamic travel package production, distribution and management solution: Lexo, Packaging Engines.

This solution, based on the leading and most performing Business Rules Management System (BRMS) « IBM WebSphere ILOG BRMS », enables a dynamic assembly of all components of a travel package and to calculate pricing in real time as customers design their individualized travel packages.

Jean-Marie Grange, Director of Implementation & Customer Relations for Accovia, showed at the "IBM Impact 2011" conference the solution Lexo, Packaging Engines and its advantages to be integrated to the IBM solution.

To watch the video, please click HERE.

Visit Europe will be equipped with the ACCOVIA's solution Lexo Packaging Engines, to overhaul its information system dedicated to travel packaging.

The integration of Lexo is planned for the first quarter of 2012.

It should allow the company to better manage inventory and assembly of various components of its travel offers.

This service will be used at first, by the tour operator in France, then in its subsidiaries in Austria, Portugal, Czech Republic, Hungary, Croatia and Poland.

Accovia was sponsor of the Totec 2011 event (Travel Technology Conferences), held on December 6, at Pavillon Cambon-Capucines in Paris.

More than 350 people participated to this event. The theme of the conference was: "Welcome to the evolution" - RFID and robotics.

To download the presentation of Totec 2011, please click on the following link:
http://www.totec.travel/edition-2011/presentations.html

Accovia has signed a distribution agreement for its solution Hubiz Travel Intelligence with ENRICH Revenue, consulting and solutions provider specializing in Revenue Management and for hotels in Spain. With this new collaboration, Accovia is accelerating its international development.

Spain is a huge tourist market with over 52 million international tourists per year[1]. In addition, the country accounts for more than 680,000 hotel rooms, which is 10% more than France[2].

In this very dynamic context, but marked by an economic situation especially sensitive, the Spanish hospitality professionals need powerful and effective tools to optimize their revenues. Indeed, they are now faced with many challenges: anticipate and better manage this important tourism market, cope with changes in consumer behavior and dealing with international competition.

To meet the new needs of this market and capitalize on its strong development potential, Accovia and ENRICH Revenue decided to collaborate. The complementarity of these two companies represents a high value-added alternative for the Spanish tourism actors. Within the framework of this partnership, ENRICH Revenue will handle the distribution of the Accovia's solution, Hubiz Travel Intelligence, in the Iberian market.

"Market knowledge of ENRICH Revenue and its added value will be decisive to stimulate sales of the latest technological solution Hubiz Travel Intelligence in the Spanish market," said Laurent Boudic, Business Development Manager Accovia.

"Revenue Management and Business Intelligence Solutions are a growing need from Spanish hospitality companies," says Christopher Bates, Managing Director ENRICH Revenue. "Therefore, we must always offer our clients the best solutions available in the market, and we are confident that the Accovia solutions are ideal to exceed client expectations."

[1] source: 2009 figures - KPMG

[2] source :KPMG -  French Analysis of January 2011 (« Analyse comparative des centres de profit des industries touristiques française et espagnole »)

Staged annually in London, World Travel Market is a vibrant must attend four day business to business event presenting a diverse range of destinations and industry sectors to UK and International travel professionals.

It is a unique opportunity for the whole global travel trade to meet, network, negotiate and conduct business under one roof. By attending World Travel Market, participants efficiently, effectively and productively gain immediate competitive advantage for their business and stay abreast with the latest developments in the travel industry.

Laurent Boudic, Business Development Manager and Patrick Bleu, Vice-President Marketing and Product Strategy will be at the WTM, on the 8th November.

To plan a meeting, please click here.

The 33rd edition of the IFTM Top Resa trade show ended Friday, 23 September 2011, having registered nearly 28,000 visitors.

Accovia was present and presented its latest innovative solutions: Lexo Packaging Engine, Lexo Transport, Hubiz Revenue Management and Hubiz Business Intelligence.

Thank you for being so many to visit us at our stand!

Do not hesitate to contact us for more information about our solutions.

Accovia Team.

ATPCO currently works with more than 460 airlines and carriers worldwide, and it supplies more than 99 percent of the industry's fare data to all the major airfare pricing engines. Its products and services organize fares into established formats that seamlessly integrate with global distribution systems, pricing engines, airline revenue management systems, governments, and related travel organizations. By providing these solutions for the travel industry, ATPCO creates efficiencies in the overall airline distribution process.

To further improve its ability to analyze trends, understand customers' needs, and easily navigate through millions of records, ATPCO wanted to develop a data warehouse and the appropriate tools to leverage the large amount of information available to them.

Accovia's technological knowledge of business intelligence solutions and expertise in the travel industry have allowed them to develop a new product that ATPCO's business analysts will use to develop a variety of graphs, dashboards, reports and execution of adhoc queries.

This solution will permit ATPCO's analysts to build reports as needed and conduct in-depth analysis on all areas of their operations quickly and easily. This analysis will require little to no intervention by technical teams and will eliminate the need for metadata that can slow response times.

"The Qlikview solution proposed by Accovia combines the speed of the functionality in memory with an associative architecture and will allow to match a number of development processes and procedures from multiple sources, as required by the constant evolving needs of ATPCO's analysts," said Philippe Motillon, Director of Hubiz Intelligence at Accovia.

IFTM Top Resa is France's international travel and tourism trade fair.

The industry's leading event for networking, doing business, innovating and keeping abreast of market developments, the exhibition offers a 360° panorama of the travel industry, covering all sectors: leisure, business and events.

Accovia is pleased to participate at the 2011's IFTM Top Resa Edition, which will take place from 20 to 23 of September in Paris - porte de Versailles - Hall 7.2.

Our team will be pleased to present you our solutions: Lexo and Hubiz Travel Intelligence.

Feel free to visit us on our Stand F71!

To organize your agenda, you can also make an appointment with us by clicking here.

Accovia, the international leader in IT solutions for the tourism industry, today announced the renewal of its license agreement with ITA Software, a leading provider of innovative solutions for the global travel industry.

ITA is a wholly owned subsidiary of Google Inc., since its acquisition in April 2011. Tour operators and travel package suppliers throughout Europe can take advantage of Accovia's powerful comparison-shopping features to quickly access a comprehensive set of low-cost fares.

Accovia was one of ITA's first customers, first integrating ITA's airfare pricing and availability search solution (QPX) into its air solution in 2000. ITA's airfare pricing and availability search results are merged with Accovia's negotiated rates with package suppliers for a best of breed travel solution.

The booking of the flight and rate selected through Accovia's solution is done directly with the airline or through a Global Distribution System (GDS). Vacation packaging websites, such as disneyworld.disney.go.com, benefit from the breadth and accuracy of the results provided by Accovia's travel solution. It evaluates billions of flight and fare comparisons per query to quickly identify the best travel option.

Below is an example of a Paris to Athens route map demonstrating numerous possible connection cities:

Accovia also plans to integrate QPX with Lexo, its new dynamic packaging software based on the most powerful Business Rules Management System on the market.  With enhancements to Lexo travel producers will benefit from the most complete transport solution, from route and availability search to flight booking, combined within travel packages.

"Our goal is to strengthen our longstanding partnership by offering this very powerful flight search engine to travel suppliers worldwide, especially in Europe," declared Patrick Bleu, Accovia's Vice President for Marketing and Product Strategy. "The addition of this solution will enable Accovia's customers to benefit from ultra-fast access to all possible combinations of flights and fare rules for a given destination or for routes with multiple stop itineraries."

"Accovia serves as a prime example of how QPX makes it easier for travel distributors to compete effectively for leisure travelers by providing powerful airfare pricing and shopping," said Eli Sanders, Technical Account Management Director, ITA Software. "We are pleased to extend this partnership, enabling Accovia to deliver the price and value that travelers demand from their European travel suppliers."

ACCOVIA joined the association XFT (Exchange For Travel) to participate actively in the language definition XFT to communicate with any actor of tourism through a common language. XFT Standard follows the path that members XFT mark out the future of tourism.

More information on the website : http://www.exchangefortravel.org/

The "Club Univers des Voyages" 's dinner, held last March 31 at La Mirande in Avignon - France, has attracted many professionals.

The friendly atmosphere and the unique setting of the restaurant, took part in the success of this evening.

Accovia was partner of the event.

Accovia announces its 5th participation to Net M@nagers 2011, the first trade event dedicated to 100% Online Tourism.

Intended for on-line and off-line French Tourism Industry leaders and decision-makers, Net M@nagers^TM pools together the largest online travel agencies, retail industry players, tour operators, airline companies, hotels, car rental agencies, ...

During 3 days, this event will become a privileged networking place, with presentations made by new technology world leading experts, but also with workshops in order to share business experiences. The principle is simple: to gather together and inform.

This operation aims to facilitate contact and exchanges between Tourism actors and decision-makers, to federate the French professionals' community and to induce and maintain networking.

This year Net M@nagers will be held from 8 to 12 June 2011 in Bangkok, Thailand.

Conference theme: "The Cloud Marketing".

The IBM Impact 2011 Global Conference was hosted at The Venetian and Palazzo Hotels in Las Vegas, April 10 to 15, 2011.

Jean-Marie Grange, Accovia's director for customer relations, had a great success during his presentation about LEXO, packaging engines and its "WebSphere ILOG" Business Rules Management System.

To read the article, please click here.

The IBM Impact 2011 Global Conference will bring together more than 6,600 technology and business leaders at a single event for a transformative learning opportunity.

This event will be hosted at The Venetian and Palazzo Hotels in Las Vegas, April 10 to 15, 2011.

Accovia will make a presentation about its solution LEXO and its "WebSphere ILOG" Business Rules Management System, April 13, 2011 from 1:30 pm to 2:45 pm. The BRMS is used to package and price services instead of building all combinations of offers and prices in a database. Accovia will present in this session the hurdles it had to manage, the solutions it put in place and the value it brings to its customers.

Program: Technology
Track: Implementing Industry Solutions for Improved ROI
Sub-track: Travel & Transportation
When: Wed, 13/Apr, 01:30 PM - 02:45 PM
Where: Venetian - Marcello 4402
Session Type: Lecture, Level: Beginner
Speaker(s): Antony Viaud, IBM; Jean-Marie Grange, Accovia

Register now by clicking here, for unique experience where you can network and get world-class education on innovative business strategies and IT technologies to drive new growth and deliver results.

For further information, please click here.

Accovia is present at QlikTech's sixth annual Global Partner Summit "Qonnections 2011", held from April 3 to 6 in Miami, USA.

Every year, more the 500 partners are present to hear about the latest technological advancements in QlikView.

Accovia will attend the next XFT meeting on March 29, 2011 :

La Guinguette du Monde
62, Avenue Gosnat
94200 Ivry sur Seine
France

Our team will share a presentation with Pierre & Vacances about the XFT language's use on the Lexo platform.

For further information, please contact us or visit Exchange For Travel by clicking here.

The seventh edition of the Ditex trade fair will be taking place in Avignon from March 31 to April 1. Held just before the outset of the summer season, Ditex expects a turnout of 1200 professionals this year. An excellent opportunity for experts to meet and discuss the industry's major issues, the fair is a two-day event entirely devoted to the travel product distribution business. At Ditex, key travel agents can learn about the sector's latest trends (in such areas as travel production methods and tools, for example), increasing their ability to offer services with high added value.

Accovia's participation in this trade show is fully in keeping with this framework. At Ditex, Accovia, an international leader in the development of IT solutions for tourism professionals, will be presenting its two innovations: Lexo, a rules engine which enables the dynamic packaging of multiple travel components; and Hubiz Travel Intelligence, a revenue optimization and decision-making tool.

Perfectly suited to meet the sector's various needs, these new solutions are intelligent management tools which facilitate such operations as inventory management, cost optimization, and risk management, allowing tourism professionals to provide original and fully customized travel products.

"Our participation in Ditex is very important to us; it's a key meeting place for distribution professionals and their suppliers," says Laurent Briquet, Deputy General Manager of Accovia France. He goes on to say that Ditex "is a trade fair characterized by a friendly atmosphere and high-quality work, all of which is ensured by the calibre of the attendees."

DITEX

Thursday, March 31, 2011 - Friday, April 1, 2011

Accovia is looking forward to welcoming you!

Aisle D, Stand N°83

Parc des Expositions RN7

Avignon

The 45th edition of ITB Berlin came to a close after attracting nearly 170,000 visitors, including 110 791 professionals and 11 163 exhibitors from 188 countries.

The Travel Technology section, in Hall 6.1, has grown significantly, attracting many more exhibitors and visitors this year. This success shows an increasing interest from the Tourism actors towards the new technologies.

For its first participation, Accovia presented its innovative solutions: Lexo, Hubiz Revenue Management and Hubiz Business Intelligence. We thank you for being so many to come and meet us at our booth, located in Hall 6.1 - Stand 112.

If you could not come this year, do not hesitate to contact us for more information about our solutions.

We look forward to seeing you at the next ITB Berlin, which will take place from 7 to 11 March 2012!

Accovia Team.

Club Med Expands Its Air Transportation Offering

With 75 resorts all over the world, Club Med, a major international player in the tourism industry, welcomed more than 1.2 million travelers in 2010. Given that, for the majority of its customers, any value-added services provided during a short-haul flight are significantly less important than those offered at the destination itself, Club Med is seeking to make low-cost options from commercial airlines available to its customers. Using Accovia's advanced technology, the Group added a new service to its line: the Webtheo program, which allows Club Med to incorporate short- and medium-haul flights at prices that are often much more attractive to its customers.

Already widespread in the German and UK markets, offers from low-cost airlines are perfectly suited to meet the needs of Club Med's customers, and especially for Mediterranean destinations. In an effort to give all of its customers access to these more attractive rates and thereby promote its vacation catalog, Club Med decided to add a new product to its transportation offering.

With the Amadeus GDS system, the Group enjoyed access to commercial airlines rates but not their cheaper rates, solely available on their websites. Club Med's goal was to offer its customers the best market prices available at any given time, in line with online rates travelers could find themselves.

As a result, Club Med has offered a more comprehensive and varied selection of transportation options since May 2010. Building on this successful initiative, the Group now regularly works with new and trustworthy airline partners like Air Berlin, GermanWings, TUI Fly, Transavia, Air Transat, Jet Star, Virgin Blue, and Condor.

So far, more than 3,000 vacations have already been booked on the Webtheo platform.   The most popular destinations with low-cost flights are Morocco, Mexico, and the Dominican Republic.

Webtheo: Putting Accovia's Expertise to Work for Club Med

The Webtheo project is part of Accovia's Lexo eProcurement platform. It was developed especially for Club Med in partnership with Anaxys in order to set up connectors with     low-cost transportation providers.

Accovia will thus be able to provide a complete range of connectors for the different travel and tourism service providers - transportation, hotels, car rentals, and destination activities -, and an efficient support for travel industry professionals.

With its architecture entirely accessible via Web Services, these eProcurement modules integrate seamlessly with the reservations systems used by vacation package providers as a stand-alone component of the information system.

In practical terms, the solution designed for Club Med is a platform hosted by Accovia and based on the SaaS (Software as a Service) model, which gives the Group complete flexibility to test and implement new connectors, where payment is based solely on completed reservations.

"For many years, Club Med has been committed to meeting customer expectation with regard to both resort experience and transportation quality. Today we have decided to go even further. Not only do we want to offer top-quality service, we want to do it at a more affordable price point. So we are thrilled with this partnership, which opens up a range of attractive pricing options to our customers when they need it," says Hervé Djiane-Gicquel, Transportation Director, Club Med.

"Low-cost companies can no longer be ignored, and it was essential that we provide our customers with this option. The successful combination of low-cost services with high-end products, such as those offered by Club Med, clearly demonstrates that we have met the needs of those clients looking for the best possible price. So we are very happy to have been a part of the success of this new business strategy," says Patrick Bleu, Vice-President Marketing and Product Strategy and Managing Director of Accovia France.

Accovia France has just announced the appointment of Laurent Briquet to the post of Deputy General Manager. He will be in charge of the operations of Accovia located in France.

A graduate in Tourism, Laurent Briquet has started out his career by working for different travel agencies and tour-operators.  These first years allowed him to build up a solid experience in the field of Tourism and very quickly in Internet.

Besides he is at the origin of the launch, in 1995, of the very first online flight tickets reservations, with "La Compagnie des Voyages", a travel agency where he worked for 10 years.

In 1999, he became General Manager for France of the online agency "ebookers.com".  During 5 years, he has set the brand on the French market and led the company to be one of the international majors, with a presence in 11 European countries.

Laurent then participated, as a consultant, to the brand and website's launch of "Promosejours.com" and "Promovols.com".

In 2005, he joined the consulting agency "Expertiz", specialized in New Technologies applied to the sector of the Tourism and Leisure, which he managed for 5 years. Throughout his career, Laurent Briquet has done numerous significant achievements in Tourism and Internet.

Laurent Briquet is today appointed Deputy General Manager of Accovia France.

His mission will be mainly to pilot the operations of Accovia France under the direction of Patrick Bleu, to support the development of the company with the existing customers and the implementation of new customers who will use Lexo and Hubiz.

" The exponential development of  Accovia Group is based on the strong ambition of its leaders, both in France and abroad" says Laurent Briquet, "I am particularly proud to take up this new professional challenge, in which I fully intend to use my whole experience''.

The ITB Berlin is the largest travel fair in the world for professionals and consumers with 110,000 visitors and more than 11,000 exhibitors from 186 countries.

Accovia is pleased to participate at the 2011's ITB Berlin Edition, which will take place from 9 to 13 of March.

Our team will be pleased to present you our solutions: Lexo and Hubiz Travel Intelligence.

Feel free to visit us on our Stand 112, Hall 6.1!

To organize your agenda, you can also make an appointment with us by clicking here.

The second edition of the Tourism & Technology Conference (TO.TE.C) was held in Paris, on December, the 7th 2010 at "Pavillon Cambon Capucines".

The theme of the conference was : "Man at the heart of technologies of the future...".

Accovia was partner of the event.

To see some extracts and interviews of the conference, click on the link: http://www.totec.travel/

To support the launch of its two new solutions, Lexo and Hubiz RM, Accovia, an international leader in software development for Tourism professionals, is strengthening its marketing and sales department in France and in Canada. Heading this team will be the general manager of Accovia France, Patrick Bleu, who has been named Vice-President of Marketing and Product Strategy for Accovia Group. The company aims to develop a global and responsive marketing strategy in order to both continue its penetration of the French market and internationally expand its activities.

Patrick Bleu began his career at Taranis, a French publisher and marketer of solutions serving some 50 tour operators. Over a ten-year period, he held various positions, namely, those of Sales Director, Technical Sales Engineer, and Project Manager.

In 1995, he founded and successfully launched Accovia France. More than 25 years of business management experience in the software and IT industry have finely honed his expertise in the field.

In addition to being General Manager of Accovia France, Patrick Bleu is now Vice-President of Marketing and Product Strategy for Accovia Group, having been named to this position past August.

"In the last 15 years at Accovia France, Patrick has shown a great deal of creativity, tremendous sensitivity in matters of image and branding, and a distinct ability to detect opportunities and create solutions. By accepting to take on this role both in France and in an international context, Patrick is enabling Accovia to globalize its efforts, ensuring consistency at Accovia Group," says Accovia Vice-President, Alain Léveillé.

A Team of Experts to Raise Accovia's Profile on the New Technology Market for the Tourism Industry

To support the launch of its new solutions and spur their rollout, Accovia, whose customers include key players in the tourism industry, is restructuring its marketing and sales department and strengthening its transnational team.

In Montreal, Canada

Daniel Parayre, Manager, Product Strategy. Daniel, who has a unique and expert background in both travel and technology, is in charge of product definition. With over 18 years of experience, he has a strategic and technical approach and is able to skilfully communicate a business vision.

Jean-Yves Lecours, Product Manager within the Product Strategy team. Jean-Yves is responsible for transport solutions. He is a specialist in air travel search engines (Sabre, Travelport, ITA).

In France

Laurent Boudic, Business Development Manager. Laurent is in charge of developing the company's activities both in France and on an international scale. In addition to significant GDS and tour operator experience, Laurent has the requisite expertise to identify prospects and showcase Accovia solutions.

Johanna Arfi, Marketing Executive. Johanna is responsible for organizing and managing all marketing and communication campaign activities, such as trade shows, events, and product document management.

"Lexo and Hubiz are the most innovative products Accovia has introduced on the market in 25 years. Our objectives are global and we intend to explore all fast-growing markets. I believe that we have assembled the best possible team of professionals to make this a reality," says Patrick Bleu, Vice-President of Marketing and Product Strategy at Accovia Group.

Accovia, an international leader in the development of IT solutions for the tourism industry, intends to do just that. At the last IFTM Top Resa trade show, Accovia introduced its most recent innovations, Lexo and Hubiz, two intelligent and dynamic solutions.

A Real Technological Breakthrough

In the highly competitive tourism market, these two new tools enable industry players to put together and provide a large variety of custom travel services which are perfectly tailored to consumers’ needs. These solutions lend unprecedented flexibility and responsiveness to travel production and distribution, making their use a real asset for tourism professionals.

Innovation in the Service of Creativity

In an ever-evolving industry faced with changing travel consumer behaviour, tourism professionals need both a high degree of adaptability, and product and service offers which meet expectations. To rise to the challenge, they need intelligent tools enabling real-time access to reliable information and allowing creative travel service production and diversification of their offering.

Well aware of these new concerns and bolstered by its in-depth understanding of the market, Accovia has launched two solutions adapted to the difficulties particular to new technologies in the tourism industry.

Lexo is the first completely rules-engine-based (a rules engine is a software system which executes business rules which can be created directly, skipping the standard software development process) system enabling the dynamic assembly of multiple travel components. Hubiz Revenue Management is a decision-making tool. Both are innovative solutions which are perfectly suited to the changes undergone by the travel industry and which meet the needs associated with the establishment of loyalty among customers who are increasingly unpredictable and demanding.

With these new products, Accovia is going beyond simple technological innovation; it is completely transforming the way we even think about travel. Until now, package pricing and creation were limited by technological constraints: the addition of new tour components required numerous IT developments. Today, thanks to Accovia’s solutions, marketing teams can unleash their creativity to think up and design the tour packages of tomorrow.

In Detail

Lexo: A New Era in Travel Packaging

For the very first time, a rules engine is at the very heart of a reservations software package. This fully novel product is, to date, the only one on the market which makes both dynamic pricing and dynamic packaging possible. It took Accovia’s team more than four years (and over 150 person-years) to develop this tool, which radically changes the way in which travel packages are designed and sold today.

With Lexo, packages are created simply through the definition and expression of a few business rules which make it possible to generate thousands of offers tailored to each client or sales channel, or adapted according to other criteria. With Lexo we can, for example, generate specific offers based on such considerations as the client’s location, the client’s contribution, the amount spent by the client the previous year, and even temperature. The criteria applied are limited only by marketers’ imagination.

Today, Lexo lets travel professionals stand out from the crowd by expanding their service offer, creating original and customized packages, and developing promotions extremely easily and almost instantly.

Hubiz Revenue Management: Selling Quality Product at the Best Price though Industry Analysis

Developed in conjunction with Mereo, a company specializing in yield management, Hubiz RM is an intelligent tool used for strategic decision-making. With a full analysis of companies’ activities, Hubiz RM allows tourism professionals to optimize their sales figures and their revenues. The establishment of ready-to-use indicators makes it possible to monitor and steer key activities, such as inventory management, forecasting and recommendation, product and client profitability assessment, and costing. An estimated 2%-7% additional revenue increase results from the analysis of all this data.

Through this partnership with Mereo, Accovia becomes the exclusive distributor of this yield management solution for the European and North African Francophone markets. Accovia and Mereo aim to continue joint development of this one-of-a-kind product in order to allow industry players to optimize revenues on multi-service offers combining hotel and airline capacity.

“These two new solutions make building and selling travel packages easier, more efficient, and more profitable. Marketers will be able to give free reign to their creativity without a need for more resources, and all the while, higher profit margins will be generated,” says Accovia COO Alain Léveillé.

i-Tourisme, October 8, 2010

Accovia, a Quebec company founded 25 years ago, is introducing Lexo on the French market. Lexo is a tool which enables dynamic packaging of multiple travel components.

"Our target market comprises companies, tour operators, hotel chains, low-cost operators, and coach operators needing to manage several travel components at once," explains Patrick Bleu, general manager of Accovia France. He goes on to say that this solution "is not a simple collection of various services put together to establish a single price; rather, it is a single price under which multiple services are offered. We adapt to the market segmentation sought by the company."

Lexo can, for example, generate specific offers based on such considerations as the client's location, the client's contribution, the amount spent by the client the previous year, and even temperature. There are so many opportunities to create original and customized packages and promotions. "We are currently in the pilot phase at Pierre & Vacances," says Mr. Bleu, who hopes to service "30% of the market within the next five years."

For example, Lexo can generate specific offers based on customer location, his contribution, how much he spent last year, the weather... So many opportunities to create creative and personalized packages, to offer discounts ... "We currently work on a pilot project with Pierre & Vacances" said Patrick Bleu, who hopes to equip "30% of the market within five years."

By the French Newsletter "Le Quotidien du Tourisme", Thursday, October 14, 2010

Accovia
2009 sales: 3.4 million
French Headquarters: Paris (75)
Market covered: Tourism

Founded nearly 25 years ago, Accovia offers advanced IT solutions and services to tourism actors.

Its catalog has now added two new solutions. Lexo is a booking software suite based on a business rules engine allowing price calculation and dynamic packaging of many travel components types.

Hubiz Revenue Management is a decision-making and revenue-optimizing tool developed in partnership with Mereo, a company specialized in revenue management solutions.

Located in Canada and France, the company employs 110 people on two continents.

LeJournalduNet, Virgile JUHAN, Tuesday, October 12, 2010

How can we improve travel packaging based on multiple and highly specific criteria?

Accovia has the solution with Lexo, a packaging engine which allows you to stand out from the competition through a multi-channel strategy. The Hubiz yield management tool serves as the ideal complement to Lexo.

Technology supplier Accovia invited Top Resa attendees to discover its new tools: Lexo, a packaging engine, and Hubiz, a yield management solution.

These new solutions, which are aimed at more modest-sized firms, make up the latest offering from the software developer, which specializes in the creation of reservation management and back-office tools for very large businesses - its clients include Euro Disney and Pierre & Vacances.

Lexo makes it possible to assemble the various components of a travel package. It can be used not only by tour operators, but also by airlines wishing to include a hotel component at the end of the flight portion of a package, and even hotel chains planning to add a flight, tours, or any other such elements to the sale of a room.

The tool is based on rules engine technology which lets you take any element whatsoever from a client's profile and use it to create a package.

Patrick Bleu, Vice-President of Marketing and Product Strategy, explains that "the marketing department's creativity is often limited by the rigid nature of the back-office system," to say nothing of the speed with which a product created using this tool is implemented.

Lexo is offered as a service for a price varying between EUR 3 and EUR 5 per reservation record. Currently in its pilot stage at Pierre & Vacances, the solution is set to be fully rolled out by the end of the year.

With Hubiz, Accovia seeks to democratize yield management tools, which usually come with a high price tag.

Hubiz facilitates the operational optimization of requests, inventory and forecast management and the forecasting of future frameworks of activity.

Hubiz promises a revenue increase of 2 to 7 %. It is available through an annual subscription the cost of which ranges from EUR 35 000 to EUR 50 000.

While Accovia expects to have a potential client base of around 30 customers in France, it is important to note that these tools can most definitely be used worldwide.

Headquartered in Canada, Accovia has its sights set not only on North America, but also on the developing tourism markets of eastern Europe, Brazil, and Asia.

Geneviève BIEGANOWSKI, Tourmag.com, Sunday, September 26, 2010

Accovia, member of GFI Solutions Group Inc. and an international leader in the development of IT solutions for the tourism industry, is introducing its two most recent innovations at the IFTM Top Resa trade show in Paris, France. With Lexo and Hubiz, two intelligent and dynamic solutions, the company is ushering a true technological breakthrough in the sector.

In the highly competitive tourism market, these two new tools enable industry players to put together and provide a large variety of custom travel services which are perfectly tailored to consumers' needs. These solutions lend unprecedented flexibility and responsiveness to travel production and distribution, making their use a real asset for tourism professionals.

Accovia: Innovation in the Service of Creativity

In an ever-evolving industry faced with changing travel consumer behaviour, tourism professionals need both a high degree of adaptability, and product and service offers which meet expectations. To rise to the challenge, they need intelligent tools enabling real-time access to reliable information and allowing creative travel service production and diversification of their offering.

Well aware of these new concerns and bolstered by its in-depth understanding of the market, Accovia is launching two solutions adapted to the difficulties particular to new technologies in the tourism industry.

Lexo is the first completely rules-engine-based[1] system enabling the dynamic assembly of multiple travel components; Hubiz Revenue Management is a decision-making tool. Both are innovative solutions which are perfectly suited to the changes undergone by the travel industry and which meet the needs associated with the establishment of loyalty among customers who are increasingly unpredictable and demanding.

With these two products, Accovia is going beyond simple technological innovation; it is completely transforming the way we even think about travel. Until now, package pricing and creation were limited by technological constraints: the addition of new tour components required numerous IT developments. Today, thanks to Accovia's solutions, marketing teams can unleash their creativity to think up and design the tour packages of tomorrow.

Lexo: A New Era in Travel

For the very first time, a rules engine is at the very heart of a reservations software package. This fully novel product is, to date, the only one on the market which makes both dynamic pricing and dynamic packaging possible.  It took Accovia's team more than four years (and over 150 person-years) to develop this tool, which radically changes the way in which travel packages are designed and sold today. With Lexo, packages are created simply through the definition and expression of a few business rules which make it possible to generate thousands of offers tailored to each client or sales channel, or adapted according to other criteria. With Lexo we can, for example, generate specific offers based on such considerations as the client's location, the client's contribution, the amount spent by the client the previous year, and even temperature. The criteria applied are limited only by marketers' imagination.

Today, Lexo lets travel professionals stand out from the crowd by expanding their service offer, creating original and customized packages, and developing promotions extremely easily and almost instantly.

Hubiz Revenue Management: Selling Quality Product at the Best Price though Industry Analysis

Developed in conjunction with Mereo, a company specializing in yield management, Hubiz RM is an intelligent tool used for strategic decision-making. With a full analysis of companies' activities, Hubiz RM allows tourism professionals to optimize their sales figures and their revenues. The establishment of ready-to-use indicators makes it possible to monitor and steer key activities, such as inventory management, forecasting and recommendations, product and client profitability assessment, and costing. An estimated 2%-7% additional revenue increase results from the analysis of all this data.

Through this partnership with Mereo, Accovia becomes the exclusive distributor of this yield management[2] solution for the European and North African Francophone markets. Accovia and Mereo aim to continue joint development of this one-of-a-kind product in order to allow industry players to optimize revenues on multi-service offers combining hotel and airline capacity.

"These two new solutions make building and selling travel packages easier, more efficient, and more profitable. Marketers will be able to give free reign to their creativity without a need for more resources, and all the while, higher profit margins will be generated," says Accovia COO Alain Léveillé.

[1] A rules engine is a software system which executes business rules which can be created directly, skipping the standard software development process.

[2] Yield management, also known as revenue management, refers to pricing and capacity management relating to airline seat and hotel room availability. Its objective is to optimize profits.

Fifth Edition of Net M@nager Brings Together 80 Participants in Vietnam

The fifth Net M@nager conference took place in Vietnam from June 10 to June 13, focusing on the theme "Economic Models".  With an estimated 80 participants in attendance, the gathering sought to bring together decision makers from the French e-tourism representing experts in new technology, and business executives.  While all the executives do not necessarily hail from the tourism industry, their participation is recognized due to their achievements in their respective domains, using highly successful methods which may sometimes be transposable in the e-tourism sector.

At the conference, a dozen experts including Arnaud de Villeneuve from Canal +, Antoine Clément from 20 Minutes, Exotissimo founder Eric Merlin, and Patrick Oualid from Pixmania, ..., shared their experiences. "This event is a forum for ideas, networking, and business opportunities," explained Laurent Briquet, CEO of Expertiz. "We chose to hold the venue in Vietnam, from Hanoi to Ha Long Bay, because this country in itself embodies such a remarkable economic model."  Varied, busy, well-organized, comprised of many surprises and even a few adventures (cycling through rice paddies, an evening in a marine cave, a night on a jonque in Ha Long Bay), this Vietnamese edition of the symposium was, according to the attendees, undeniably one of the best Net M@nager conferences ever held. The conference was sponsored by some 15 partner organizations, including Vietnam Airlines, Sofitel, Paradise Cruises, and Mondial Assistance.

[Journalist Didier San Martin of the Quotidien du Tourisme is also a novelist. (Read more here)]

View our article in images (link).

Didier San Martin, Le Quotidien du Tourisme, Hanoi, Tuesday, June 15, 2010 (11h37).

We have the great pleasure of announcing two appointments, effective April 5, 2010, at GFI Solutions Group Inc. (GFI) and its subsidiary, Accovia Inc.

Michel Simard, former executive vice-president and chief operating officer at Accovia, was named vice-president of special projects at GFI. He will be in charge of various corporate projects as part of his main duties in this new post.

After two years as vice-president of product strategy and architecture at Accovia, Alain Léveillé was promoted to the position of vice-president and chief operating officer at Accovia. Alain, who has more than 25 years of software development experience, is well known and well respected throughout the travel industry. He is already closely involved in numerous Accovia projects.

With close to 1,000 employees, GFI is a leader in IT solutions in Canada. In business for over 20 years, GFI has pursued an active growth strategy through targeted acquisitions, including, most recently, Fortsum Business Solutions Inc., Bell Business Solutions Inc., and Accovia Inc. Over a five-year period, these acquisitions have enabled the company to increase its annualized revenues and employee base fivefold.

Martin Jolicoeur, Les Affaires.com, November 11, 2009

GFI Solutions Group was used to acquisitions. However, when it bought BCE subsidiary Bell Business Solutions in the summer of 2008, the IT firm suddenly found itself in an altogether different league.

As a result of this acquisition, GFI's revenue grew by 70% and its workforce, by 88%. This meant that the company was now faced with a full-out exercise in team integration.

"GFI faced a serious challenge, not only in terms of human resources management, but also in terms of rebranding," explains Gilles Létourneau, president and chief executive officer of GFI and a finalist in the 2009 CEO of the Year Awards.

BCE had demanded that GFI stop using the Bell Business Solutions brand and logo within the 30 days following the transaction.

"Having to change a company's name, logo, stationery, and promotional material, along with the business cards of 350 employees, in only a month, during the industry's busiest time - I can assure you, this was no walk in the park," says Létourneau.

Any other company would have been frazzled by such an undertaking; not GFI, however. It has, since then, continued to pursue its strategy of growth through targeted acquisition. In 2009, with help from the Solidarity Fund QFL, GFI acquired Fortsum Business Solutions, an accounting and financial management software publisher.

GFI, which today has a staff of nearly 1 000 employees, closed 2009 with revenues of more than $106 million. Its goal in 2010: a stock market listing.

GFI is both on Branham's list of the top 25 Canadian professional ICT service providers and Branham's list of the top 250 Canadian ICT companies.

You can read this article in French by clicking on the following link: http://www.lesaffaires.com/dossier/prix-pdg-de-l-annee-sgf/gilles-letourneau-monsieur-acquisitions/510863

Learn more on this event at http://www.totec.travel

Comtec has reached an agreement with the Canadian travel solutions technology provider Accovia, a member of GFI Solutions Group Inc. The multi-year deal will enable Accovia to become the exclusive distributor of Comtec's Travelink Tour Operating Software in the Canadian marketplace.

As part of this concerted move into the Canadian market, Comtec will work jointly with Accovia to localize the Travelink product, leveraging their industry knowledge and expertise.  Building on the successful foundations of the alliance in the French markets, Accovia will act as the primary sales and support contact for customers, with Comtec offering back up services.

"This is a key move into the Canadian market for Travelink," comments Simon Powell, Comtec CEO. "The combination of Travelink's technology providing optimized performance as well as an increased return on investment with Accovia's in-depth understanding of the Canadian market."

Michel Simard, Accovia's Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer comments: "This is exciting news for Canadian Tour Operators.  With Travelink, Accovia will extend its services to better include small and medium size companies. Travelink is a complementary technology to Accovia's suite of solutions. Our combined expertise will bring greater value to our customers."  

Paula Morris, Senior Director, Sales and Customer Service, adds: "By putting its 24 years of experience behind Travelink, Accovia is bringing to market the cost effective alternative Canadian Tour Operators have been waiting for." Comtec will be exhibiting at World Travel Market in Excel, London from the 9th to the 12th of November 2009.  Accovia is a major sponsor and speaker at the Sabre Tourism Technology Conferences - TO.TE.C in Paris on the 6th of November 2009.

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Bringing together industry, government, and supplier flight data in the context of your own business is a challenge.  Finding and using the applicable data to improve and enhance your business is the goal. 

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Last fall, Accovia defined with target customer Pierre & Vacances an ambitious plan of 4 deliveries up to the deployment and operation of its new platform for wholesalers. This new product, aka internally under the code name IBIZA, is based upon a BRMS (Business Rules Management System) in which the wholesaler can define its own business rules for package offering, price reductions, sales conditions, etc. Last June, the Ibiza team proudly delivered to P&V the version 0.8 (second of four), for which their teams have just completed running the test scenarios during the UAT (User Acceptance Testing ) phase.  It is with this release that product configuration has started with the help of the Accovia's implementation team.

Works are fully under way for the next release, version 0.9. The development phase is now completed in various teams, and integrated QA is at its peak. Of course, this release is extremely important for us, since the first bookings will be made with version 0.9 at Pierre & Vacances.  Before the end of December, development for version 1.0 will be completed. It will include all the functionalities required by P&V to operate this solution seamlessly for all their residential accommodations.