Aer Lingus continues to pioneer new ancillary and merchandising business models through the Datalex Travel Distribution Platform

Dublin, December 16, 2008 - Aer Lingus has launched new fare merchandising capabilities which enable the up-sell and cross-sell of flexible fares across multiple routes. Their new branded ‘flexi’ fare reflects the Aer Lingus strategy to offer innovative price and service options to the customer. The Datalex Travel Distribution Platform gives Aer Lingus the control and flexibility required to dynamically create fare families with bundled fees and services and management of the PNR. 

In addition, by virtue of the TDP Business Rules Centre, Aer Lingus has also launched a new ancillary service option for ‘extra weight’ shopping enabling customers to pay for excess baggage online at discounted rates.

Aer Lingus has relied on the Datalex Travel Distribution Platform (TDP) to drive its primary distribution channel www.aerlingus.com since 2002. Today, TDP enables approximately 80% of air bookings at lowest distribution cost.

Aer Lingus continues to deploy TDP components to drive yield through advanced fare merchandising, ancillary shopping and reservation features, and pioneer new online distribution business models. 

Recent deployments of the Datalex Travel Distribution Platform on www.aerlingus.com have included advanced TDP Business Rules Centre (BRC) features to enable fare and tax discounts, pre-seat selection fees, baggage fees, manage booking functionality, integrated flight driven car rental booking process and integrated insurance booking. Such features have been fundamental to the substantial growth in ancillary revenues. Datalex also completed the deployment of a TDP e-interlining solution in support of the JetBlue and Aer Lingus partnership. This ground-breaking partnership opens over 40 destinations on the JetBlue network in the US to passengers booking online at aerlingus.com.

Aer Lingus can now easily extend its use of TDP to develop supplementary business rules for branded fares and other innovative ancillary products and services during specified promotional periods across specified routes or route groups.

About Datalex

Datalex is a leading provider of travel distribution software and solutions that enable global travel industry suppliers and distributors deliver increased content and choice to their customers across multiple sales channels, while enabling record reductions in distribution costs. Its customers represent the travel industry elite and include major airlines and travel distribution organizations.

Headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, the company maintains offices in Europe, Asia, Australia and USA. Datalex is a publicly held company traded on the Irish Stock Exchange (symbol: DLE, and also OTC: DLEXY). For more information, please visit the company’s website at www.datalex.com.

Contact

Ornagh Hoban
Datalex, Ireland
+ 353 1 806 3500
newsdept@datalex.com