United Airlines has "spared no expense" in preparing for the switch to a unified passenger services system, scheduled to occur before the end of the current quarter, according to senior vice president of worldwide sales Dave Hilfman. Following its merger with Continental Airlines, United opted to consolidate operations on Continental's pre-existing Shares system, furnished by HP.
Jay Boehmer and I just spoke with Brian Cook, a former Sita executive who recently joined HP Enterprise Services as vice president and general manager for travel and transportation. On the job about two weeks, Cook didn't give us much on what presumably are the company's two biggest transportation projects--
AA's new Jetstream res system and the migration next year of
United over to the Shares system. Cook and a spokesperson noted that his job is a new one after HP decided to create several verticals within its Enterprise Services division, and that he is "heavily involved" with those AA and UA initiatives.
Hewlett-Packard today said its "next-generation" travel technology platform will include, newly branded air reservations system Agilaire, parts of which will be applied to
American Airlines' fledgling Jetstream res system.
[EDIT: We got the interview. Details to come in
The Beat.]
After
The Beat's two recent stories about
Microsoft and EDS teaming up for airline and travel technology, two readers asked if we knew whether the cooperation would "have legs" following the expected
Hewlett-Packard acquisition of EDS, announced today.
Our answer is: We have no idea, but we hope it doesn't hurt our chances for an interview with Microsoft.
According to one reader's speculation,
