Travelport: GDS share gains at Priceline

Gordon Wilson, hosting his first earnings call today as Travelport’s president and CEO, says Travelport is taking an increased share of GDS bookings at Priceline.

Travelport officials declined to elaborate.

In 2010, Priceline was Travelport’s second largest travel agency customer, wedged between Orbitz Worldwide as #1 and Expedia as #3.

Travelport’s gains in Priceline GDS bookings likely come at the expense of Sabre GDS, which also takes Priceline bookings, and their combined share would perhaps come out of a shrinking pie since Priceline is ramping up American Airlines direct-connect bookings through Farelogix and these don’t involve a GDS.

It is unclear whether a new agreement or understanding between Travelport and Priceline might be propelling the changing dynamics.

Travelport reported its first half of 2011 earnings today.

Among the news bites, Travelport says its air segments in Russia increased 70% in the first half of 2011 compared with the year-earlier period, and segments in the BRIC region — Brazil, Russia, India and China, rose 3% in the second quarter.

BRIC now accounts for 7% of Travelport’s segments, officials say.

In other news, Wilson says Travelport’s universal desktop, which debuted in Australia, is currently being tested in New Zealand and South Africa and will be rolled out in seven countries in the not-too distant future.

And Wilson provided an update about Travelport’s Universal API, saying 350 developers are accessing the API, which eventually will be expanded to mobile and corporate booking tools.

On a sobering note, CFO Philip Emery says Travelport is expected to take an annualized $ 40 to $ 60 million EBITDA hit from United Airlines’ decision to transition its reservation from Travelport’s Apollo system to HP/EDS.

Tnooz

Priceline to continue testing and expanding local deals

Priceline’s hotel and car rental business grew substantially in the second quarter, and the company also is pondering local deals as a new revenue stream.

Jeffery Boyd, Priceline’s CEO, says the company, which is testing local deals under a private label partnership in New York City, may soon add another city or two to see if consumers are receptive to receiving local deals under the Priceline brand.

“As everyone knows, there is a lot of clutter in the space now,” Boyd said, answering questions during today’s second quarter earnings call.

One of Priceline’s rivals, Expedia, powers Groupon Getaways, a new vacation flash-sales offering, and and it’s difficult to keep track of all the companies entering the local deals arena.

Speaking of another new travel industry space, Boyd commented on the emergence of Airbnb and its person-to-person apartment and vacation rental business.

Boyd said it is an attractive new category for a segment of travelers, adding that Airbnb is an “interesting business” and a “potential nice addition” to the vacation rental market. Boyd said Priceline wishes the best for Airbnb.

Meanwhile, Priceline’s net income grew 123% to $ 256.4 million during the second quarter on $ 1.1 billion in revenue, a 43.7% jump.

Priceline’s profits grew on the strength of increases in global hotel room nights at subsidiaries Booking.com and Agoda, and car rental day growth at TravelJigsaw, which climbed 56% and 55%, respectively.

In the U.S., rising airfares over the last few years helped Priceline’s opaque air business, and air ticket sales increased more than 7%, Boyd said.

Boyd said Priceline benefited from airline revenue managers using the company’s Name Your Own Price product.

Tnooz