Internal changes within the Business Units (BUs) of the PASS Consulting Group: The two business units Travel and Logistics are merging to form the new BU Travel & Logistics. In order to successfully position themselves for the fifth decade of PASS' company history, the merger comes at just the right time for the two profitable divisions. Nothing will change for PASS customers, but both Business Units intend to benefit enormously from each other's know-how in the future.
Worldwide, there is a strong demand for travel bookings following the decline of the Corona pandemic, and business travel is also increasing significantly again. At the same time, however, the industry has to successfully manage the balancing act between the shrinking workforce and the simultaneous increase in complexity of its direct sales (also due to the new XML standard New Distribution Capability – NDC).
During the Corona crisis, the logistics sector was already busy collecting record figures, partly because a lot more purchases were made online. In view of the conflict in Eastern Europe, however, the industry is now struggling above all with a lack of drivers and disrupted supply chains. Against this background, software solutions such as PASS PLANTOUR are becoming increasingly important for planning efficient and economical delivery tours throughout Europe.
Highly profitable travel and optimization products
The API products of PASS Travel Solutions are among the most successful in their industry segment. With the intelligent Travel Web API iXX1, which is a further development based on the extremely productive XX1 software of the early 2000s, PASS has already been offering intelligent middleware since 2019 that filters travel offers according to individual criteria, merges them, provides them with rules and makes them available via a web interface. Today, PASS handles about five million API requests per day, with an expected growth of 100 percent per year.
Although the industry does not expect to return to pre-pandemic figures until 2023/2024, PASS has already been able to significantly increase its processing figures thanks to a higher market share and is increasingly establishing itself as the central platform for the largest travel management companies (TMCs) such as BCD Travel or the business travel franchise company Lufthansa City Center.
In the area of Passenger Name Records (PNR) management, especially with regard to travel risk management, PASS has been able to increase its throughput a hundredfold in the last three years with a new software solution based on microservices - and the trend is still rising. Well-known customers include International SOS, Crisis24 and Healix.
PASS Logistics Solutions (PLS), which has been on the market for three decades, has also recorded continuous growth over the past five years. The focus is primarily on the topics of sustainability and optimization. With the cross-industry route planning software PLANTOUR and the API solution MAPSERVICES, which provides truck route optimization via REST API from the cloud, PLS provides the right answers to the challenges of modern Logistics 4.0. Today, numerous customers from the pharmaceutical trade, cash-in-transit and food/non-food retail sectors rely on the services and solutions of the company division.
Synergies in the areas of Maps & Travel and environmental sustainability
"With our merger, we want to further strengthen the international focus of PASS Consulting Group and benefit from common points of connection," says Michael Strauss, CEO of Miami-based PASS Consulting Corporation and Head of Business Unit Travel. "After all, from an IT management perspective, there are some commonalities in the transportation of people and goods." Both business units bring great growth opportunities to the market and together are on solid economic footing. "Environmental sustainability and CO2 reduction in particular are likely to be the focus for many companies in the coming years. In addition, one must not forget that the journey usually begins at the front door and not at the airport," agrees his colleague Jan Junker, Member of the Board of PASS Logistics Solutions AG and Head of Business Unit Logistics. The newly created Travel & Logistics Business Unit will be led by the two previous BU heads as a dual leadership team.
Numerous opportunities and new markets are emerging, particularly in the areas of "sustainable travel and transport", but also in ecological responsibility with regard to the planning of business trips around the globe. The optimization solutions for transport logistics, which have so far been tailored primarily to the European market, are to be rolled out worldwide.
The new division also sees itself well positioned in the light of the growing requirements for business intelligence solutions for travel & logistics and big data solutions for companies. In the future, the focus will be on exploiting synergies, internationalization, further growth and thus successfully shaping the joint future.