Real-time data transforms Ciena’s travel program

Justin Schuster: Thank you for joining us today for another episode of the Travel is a Human Emotion podcast. My name is Justin Schuster and I’m the SVP of Marketing at Spotnana. I’m very excited to share that my guest today is Fazal Choksi. He is the Global Head of Travel and Director of Indirect Procurement at Ciena. Fazal was also recognized as a best practitioner by BTN in 2025. Fazal, could you start off by just giving us a quick overview of Ciena? What does Ciena do?

Fazal Choksi: Thank you, Justin. I’m delighted to be here to speak with you. Ciena is a global leader in high-speed connectivity. We build adaptive networks to support growth in bandwidth demand, which empowers our customers, partners, and communities to thrive in this era of AI. With our expertise and innovation in networking systems, automation software, and services, we revolutionize data transmission and network management. For example, our technology powers undersea cable networks that connect continents, ensuring connectivity for businesses and individuals worldwide. In addition, our solutions support 5G rollouts and cloud migrations for major telecom operators. We operate in about 35 countries and have close to 9,000 employees globally. With annual revenues approaching $5 billion, we enable the largest telecom providers, enterprises, and governments to build these adaptive networks.

Justin Schuster: That is quite a large travel program that you’re operating in 35 countries. When you think about running a global travel program using Solutions Travel as your TMC and Spotnana as your travel platform, what is different about running a travel program today versus how it felt to do that years ago?

Fazal Choksi: Firstly, as I said, we operate in about 35 countries and support thousands of trips with an annual spend close to $30 million. We manage travel for employees, customer and supplier visits, industry events, internal leadership meetings, and generally any sort of business requirement. We work with Solutions Travel and Spotnana as the OBT.

What is different now compared to the past? Travel is much more dynamic and focused on flexibility, sustainability, and real-time decision-making. For example, during the pandemic, we had to quickly adapt our policies to address flight cancellations, border restrictions, and remote work needs. Now, with tools like Spotnana, we can instantly adjust our itineraries or policies in seconds or minutes based on current events, geopolitical developments, or weather disruptions. This is on top of us focusing more on reducing our carbon footprint by being able to encourage rail travel in regions like Europe where it’s more mature, and some areas of the US where distances are not too great—for example, looking at DC to New York. It is very different in the sense that it’s all instantaneous; you’ve got data at your fingertips.

Justin Schuster: Fantastic. You were an early adopter of Solutions Travel. How would you describe the experience of working with them and how is that different perhaps from working with other TMCs you’ve worked with in the past?

Fazal Choksi: This was one of the drivers for us to move to a company like Solutions Travel. Previously, we were with a mega TMC and we felt lost in a big pond. We didn’t get the focused attention that we wanted for our program. It was really good to have a partner with whom I could interact on a daily basis if necessary. I could reach their senior leadership, like the CEO Mark Walton, at any time. I know Mark is there if I need to call him at any time of the day. It is that focused attention and the bespoke white-glove service we needed for our senior leaders. We created a VIP desk for our senior leadership and some road warriors as well; that was a service we were craving.

Also, getting changes implemented in the system took forever with a mega TMC. Now, with Spotnana in the background, we can get things done in minutes, like changing policy requirements. If we want to restrict travel to some countries because of a situation in Russia, for example, or if we need to restrict people from traveling with their own laptops, we can do that instantaneously without having to wait for adjustments to be done by raising a ticket. We are much leaner, faster, and can make decisions much more quickly.

Justin Schuster: You mentioned on a recent BTN webinar that you are very focused on data and taking a data-driven approach to managing your travel program. What are some of the things you do that are very data-centric?

Fazal Choksi: Data-driven for me means using insights to help me optimize spend, improve compliance, and enhance traveler satisfaction and safety. Duty of care is a very important aspect of our travel program. For example, we analyzed booking data and found that certain flight routes had low adoption from our preferred airlines, which led us to renegotiate contracts for better rates with those specific airlines.

Having real-time data at my fingertips allows me to react much quicker with any of my partners, whether it is a hotel, an airline, or a car rental company. Similarly, real-time dashboards showed us higher than expected hotel costs in certain cities, which prompted us to adjust our preferred hotel chains and negotiate discounts. These insights help us align travel decisions with broader business objectives like cost reduction or optimization. Otherwise, I would be waiting for data and downloading Excel spreadsheets, which takes forever and loses momentum. When you have it at your fingertips during a call, you can just bring it up in a dashboard and share the data with the partner. It really helps in making quick decisions.

Justin Schuster: What does “data nirvana” look like to you? What is it that you would like to do that you still can’t do today?

Fazal Choksi: That is a good question. For me, this would be a unified platform integrating all travel-related data: spend, traveler preferences, sustainability metrics, and external factors like geopolitical risks. We are getting close to “best in class” with Spotnana. I would love to use AI to predict the best travel options for employees based on their past behavior. We know what they’ve done in the past on a particular route and we know their seating preferences; this could help me optimize cost and convenience.

Also, automating carbon footprint analysis for every trip would allow us to align travel decisions with Ciena’s sustainability goals. Imagine a system that dynamically adjusts based on real-time conditions, weather disruptions, political instability, or traveler safety and efficiency. Spotnana has agentic AI in the pipeline—a travel agent that can do bookings without human interaction and figure out that “Joe Bloggs” likes a specific route, airline, and seat, and complete it in an instant.

Justin Schuster: When you think about the technology you are most excited about over the next few years, is it all related to AI and data, or are there other things that are top of mind?

Fazal Choksi: In travel, yes, it’s primarily the booking experience and spend analysis. If it can churn out reports saying we need to negotiate a specific route with American Airlines, United, or Air Canada, those insights would be very good. We are also looking at AI in other parts of our business like procurement and finance. As a company in the AI field, we are at the forefront and looking at AI in every aspect of our business, travel included. For example, we are looking at having one of our bots interrogate data. I could ask the bot, Navi, “Hey Navi, what’s my spend for this department?” and Navi would churn out data without me having to go into a dashboard. The future is going to be incredibly enabled by AI.

Justin Schuster: Undoubtedly. Earlier you mentioned you are also responsible for the meetings and events side of things. Is that a new development or did you always oversee both transient and non-transient travel?

Fazal Choksi: For meetings and events, we have a marketing team that covers large events, like our sales and marketing kickoff where 1,300 people attend a meeting, primarily in the USA. As procurement, we handle some of the smaller meetings. We use tools like Troop to help us shortlist locations and perform benchmarking. Our hotel partners are very good; we can float an RFP on their websites quickly and get responses in a matter of days. So, we do do small meetings within the procurement team as well.

Justin Schuster: When you think about your goals for this year, is there anything else that comes to mind that we didn’t already cover?

Fazal Choksi: Sustainability is a key goal for us. AI and improving the traveler experience are also primary goals, along with cost optimization. We are all looking at how to optimize spend to hit the bottom line. Duty of care is just a given for our program. In short, it’s about getting smarter at how we do things to create an advantage for our travel program.

Justin Schuster: One of the things I remember you talking about on a recent webinar was unused ticket credits. Could you describe again how things are different now from where they were?

Fazal Choksi: That was one of our major pain points when evaluating for a new TMC. Previously, this was managed on an Excel spreadsheet and only in some regions; for example, they didn’t track it in EMEA. I don’t know how much value Ciena lost because of that. Now with Spotnana, refunded or canceled tickets are on the platform and can be used for future bookings. It is online, available, and visible at checkout. Looking at past data, we had about $300,000 sitting in unused tickets and it was a real struggle to claw those back. Luckily, we managed to put the majority of that onto a UATP card through our airline relationships. But with Spotnana, it works like a dream—it is there in the profile and it’s fantastic.

Justin Schuster: Fazal, since this is the Travel is a Human Emotion podcast, we always ask guests about the connection between travel and human emotions. What stands out most for you?

Fazal Choksi: Travel is deeply emotional because it fosters connections and drives inspiration. I’ve seen how face-to-face meetings with customers or suppliers lead to stronger partnerships and drive innovation that wouldn’t have been possible over virtual calls. On a personal level, travel creates a moment of discovery—whether it’s experiencing a new culture or sharing a meal with colleagues or partners abroad—that leaves lasting impressions. These human connections and shared experiences make travel impactful from both a professional and personal point of view. You can only achieve so much on Zoom calls; they are efficient in certain scenarios, but for some partnerships, you need face-to-face interaction to create value. I wouldn’t want to do most of my large negotiations over a Zoom call. Meeting face-to-face helps build those relationships that drive value.

Justin Schuster: Very well said. Fazal, thank you so much for joining us today. We appreciate you being a guest and sharing your insights with us.

Fazal Choksi: Justin, thank you very much. Really appreciate it.