Accelerate the Path-to-Revenue and Delight with New Distribution Capability (NDC)

The New Distribution Capability (NDC) initiative aims to provide airlines with the ability to retail their offerings across channels. This transformation will enable a dynamic airline shopping experience for travelers while creating new revenue opportunities for airlines and travel agencies. As an IATA strategic partner, Coforge has participated in multiple workgroups to define business requirements for the NDC standard schemas. This knowledge, coupled with our vast experience and expertise in the airline IT landscape, makes us a partner of choice for airlines to collaborate on this transformational journey

It’s Time to Create a Whole New Experience

According to a forecast by International Air Transport Association (IATA), the number of air travelers across the globe is estimated to grow to a whopping 3.6 billion by 2016, 800 million more than it was in 2011. This is the time for airlines to pull out all the stops to capitalize on this opportunity and grab maximum market share. This can only be achieved through personalized and seamless interaction with customers.

IATA’s New Distribution Capability promises a favorable impact on the airline-traveler relationship. The ability to identify a consumer in the initial phase of the sales process across different channels will allow airlines to dynamically construct and offer personalized products. The NDC initiative provides an innovative approach for airlines to distribute their products and services through indirect channels. With a multitude of benefits for travelers, airlines, agencies and aggregators, NDC aims to provide a more personalized airline shopping experience with additional revenue generating opportunities for airlines and travel agencies.

Get Future-Ready with NDC Solutions

Coforge has been working closely with IATA and industry veterans on the NDC initiative, actively participating in various IATA NDC workgroups. Our team is working with industry experts for chalking out future-ready solutions, and collaborating with leading airlines and travel management company (TMC) partners to understand the impact of NDC on the existing processes and IT systems.

We provide consulting and IT services for airlines, TMCs, and online travel agencies (OTAs) for implementing NDC. Some of our key solutions include:

• NDC "Offer and Order Engine" development for airlines
• Profile development and hosting for airlines
• Revenue accounting and integrity services for airlines
• User interface and middleware development and testing services for travel agencies and aggregators

Charting Your NDC Journey

If adopting NDC is on your agenda, our team can get involved with your key stakeholders and IT teams to perform:

• Impact Analysis: We help you understand the impact of NDC on the existing business processes and IT systems for reservation, fulfillment, electronic miscellaneous document (EMD), customer service, booking management, interlining, and revenue accounting. We also help you find specific solutions to overcome the NDC-related challenges of your organization
• Business Process Modeling: We offer expertise and methodologies to re-model critical business processes to minimize impact on productivity and efficiency process management (BPM), and vendor management activities.

Enabling a Smooth Take-Off for Airlines

From an airline perspective, we have developed a quick-start model for NDC enablement. This model enables airlines to keep their existing core systems for passenger service systems (PSS) and loyalty unchanged, while developing an ‘NDC Offer and Order Engine.’ This provides the building blocks needed to fully leverage the benefits of NDC in the areas of offer management, personalization, merchandising, and creating dynamic offers. The offer engine provides real-time personalized offers based on customer profiles. It integrates with other core systems, enhancing solutions for ancillary sales, revenue accounting and integrity, and electronic miscellaneous documents. With our solution, airlines can rapidly gain the flexibility to deliver seats and custom offers using NDC specifications, creating a new business model that fulfills the promise of airline retailing while enhancing the customer engagement.

Delivering More Value

Within a short period, airlines and travel agencies can achieve their business objectives for self-operated routes without significant investments. The key benefits of partnering with Coforge include:

• Flexible solution meeting the requirements of your enterprise
• Robust NDC offer and order solution based on open systems, leading to alignment with your organization's standards and cost optimization
• Agility to respond to the evolving airlines marketplace by enabling decoupled rules to boost affinity selling, cross-selling, and ancillary revenues
• Innovative solution and phased approach, leading to faster return on investment (ROI), and reduced impact of implementation