How JTB Business Travel combines service DNA with modern technology

Justin Schuster

Welcome to the Travel as a Human Emotion podcast. My name is Justin Schuster and I’m the VP of Marketing at Spotnana. And my guest today is Geert de Boo, General Manager and Vice President of Global Travel at JTB Business Travel. Geert, I wonder if you could kick things off by telling us a little bit about JTB Business Travel and your role over there.

Geert De Boo

Sure. Thank you, Justin, for having me here. It’s a privilege to have a conversation with you and Spotnana. So I represent JTB Business Travel. We’re part of a large global company that originates in Japan. We have a history of over 100 years. We celebrate 113 years this year. And the great thing about that is we’ve always been about service. So service is in our DNA at JTB, born out of the concept of omotenashi, which is sort of a concept of hospitality in Japan that you always make sure your client, your traveler has the best experience.

That’s still a really important part of our DNA, even though we live in an age of technology, we still strongly believe in that service DNA as a key differentiator in travel. I am Vice President of Global Business Travel at JTB USA and from the U.S., we manage the JTB Business Travel brand, which is a collaboration among many JTB companies around the globe working together to provide seamless business travel management solutions to the mid-market. I’m responsible for that globally, overseeing North America, Europe, and us expanding also in Asia Pacific and partnering obviously closely with our company in Japan.

Justin Schuster

JTB Business Travel announced a partnership with Spotnana a year ago and recently announced that our partnership has expanded. I wanted to ask you to go back in time to that first announcement and help us understand why did you decide to form a partnership with Spotnana in the first place and then how has that partnership grown over time?

Geert De Boo

Yes. This goes a while back where we were thinking obviously about what our next-generation tech stack looks like? How can we, coming out of the pandemic, be ready for what the changes dictate in the market, which is, better user experiences, higher efficiencies, bringing in fragments of content. So we evaluated different technologies and tools and got really excited learning about what Spotnana is doing, seeing the traction that your technology had.

We were in particular looking because we entered into a partnership with a new sustainability software startup in Denmark, Goodwings, that is working to decarbonize business travel and was looking for a technology to power their travel.

We were already evaluating Spotnana and felt Spotnana was a really good fit for what they needed. Their customers are tech savvy, really focusing on self-service in a platform that has a similar experience as their travelers are used to when they book their own personal travel. So we entered into this partnership and it’s been a really exciting journey together to roll it out across multiple markets in Europe and now also globally for Goodwings.

Now we’re evolving to the next step where with all the experience we have, with all the infrastructure we built, and maybe we’ll talk a little bit about that, what’s different working with Spotnana versus a traditional technology ecosystem. 

With all that we’ve built, we are now ready to expand that beyond Goodwings to our JTB global customers to leverage the global network that we have within JTB Business Travel to provide this technology, the better user experiences, the bringing together all the content in one place, the ability to easily launch a global program for make market customers to really bring that to our customers too.

And beyond that, building all that infrastructure together. Our ability to, for instance, in Singapore to fulfill locally, to provide local invoices. That’s obviously not just great for Goodwings or JTB customers, but potentially we can also leverage that to bring value to other Spotnana users around the globe. And so we expand the partnership also to support fulfillment in those markets around the world.

Justin Schuster

Well, fantastic. And there’s a lot there to double click into. Why don’t we talk first about content fragmentation and how you’re experiencing that as a TMC and what are the things that you’re doing to try and address that for your customers?

Geert De Boo

Yeah, that’s a very loaded question. So much is changing in our industry and obviously every TMC is challenged with content fragmentation. Every company, every corporate account is challenged with that.

The time that we had just one easy single source of content, GDS, that time is gone and probably may never return. We see big changes on the supplier side, where suppliers are consolidating, are becoming very powerful. With modern technology, they are very strong in directly reaching the end travelers, also the corporate travelers.

All the enhancement we see in self-servicing that travelers have experienced is in the leisure market. All those things drive, think, that suppliers are much more powerful in trying to push their content directly to travelers, to corporates, to corporate travelers. so with maybe starting with LCCs, now with airlines, with NDC, direct…

But also on the hotel side, we see it increasingly where hotels are really pushing for corporate travelers to book directly on their platform. That’s posing, obviously, it’s really challenging the proposition of TMCs as a single source of content, as a place where you put all your travel in. I think it’s exactly that challenge, that’s also an opportunity for TMC to, if you have the right technology to continue to be that one stop shop. It may be a different technology ecosystem, but I believe it’s still the best proposition of a TMC to be that one place for corporate account to have it all managed, to be that aggregator of content, to be that one source of data, to be that one source for knowing where your travelers are and bringing it all together.

It requires that all that content is presented in a way that feels similar to what the suppliers directly are doing, because we’ve all become used to those sort of the way suppliers, airlines, hotels directly interact with us through their apps, their online platforms.

I understand from as a corporate traveler, when the booking experience, the corporate booking experience is very different, it’s frustrating. Why can’t a corporate booking experience be very similar to a personal one? Albeit that things are different, I need to provide maybe different data, my company is paying, which means that they may plan.

I know that there’s things different, but we should be able to solve that puzzle of can we give that personal leisure experience to a corporate tool and not let the traveler find in the maze of content their thing, but present it in a way that they don’t have to worry about comparing and looking in many different places.

That’s also where we’re excited about our partnership because in that fragmented world or content fragmentation, Spotnana is really helping us to solve some of that puzzle and bring it together in new ways. And new ways are never easy, but that makes it a fun journey to figure out how can we build those direct pipes? How can we build an experience, a booking experience that’s similar to what they are? How can we build the confidence that they only have to go to one place in the same way they you know, maybe go to an online shopping, at let’s say Amazon, and don’t have to compare because they trust they bring it all together. That’s what we want to accomplish together with Spotnana too.

Justin Schuster

Content fragmentation seems like one way in which the distribution landscape is evolving. There’s more sources of content to be able to integrate and aggregate now. But there’s also evolution in terms of the functionality of the pipes, the content pipes themselves, and more opportunity in the future with some of the digital transformation efforts that the airlines and the hotels are going through. How are you thinking about that future? In what ways do you see distribution continuing to evolve, and how are you preparing for that?

Geert De Boo

Related to what I was saying about how the landscape of suppliers has changed, that push for direct, I see that continuing. I think we need to be ready. At the same time, I think we don’t have to connect with all airlines directly. If you look at the global consolidation in the airline landscape, there are a couple of large airline groups that if we build pipes to, we can cover a lot of that direct content.

And so I believe that there’s still also an important place for the GDSs. And because of the smaller airlines, because of content fragmentation, that they may be able to provide different content. For that reason, I believe that there will still continue to be a marketplace for aggregators. And I think the role of the GDS will change.

They will become much more, again, aggregators, which in a way is still a global distribution system, but maybe with a newer connotation to what that means, we see GDSs change in terms of the way they aggregate content on the hotel side drastically, where it’s no longer just the GDS content, but they bring in all kind of aggregators from the same perspective of ensuring that

All content can be aggregated into one place for a better user experience. So I think we look at a landscape of distribution that keeps evolving where we will see a shift to more direct integrations, direct pipes to airlines and hotels. But I think complemented still with a world where I don’t see the GDS completely becoming obsolete, they will continue to play an important role in keeping that dynamic in place with the direct pipes and all the other fragments and content.

And who knows, maybe there was a day that they build different pipes with the airlines and rise again as one source, but I’m not betting on that. And so I’m glad that we have a partner where we can have both still all the benefits of a GDS with also all the benefits of having direct integrations.

Justin Schuster

From an architecture perspective, Spotnana sees a GDS the same way as we see other content sources. And we’re doing the best that we can to pull all of that content and information together in a single modern shopping experience for our partners and for their customers.

Geert De Boo

Yeah, I think one of the things that we’ll see the biggest change maybe, and which is sort of still the X vector, is that the whole commercial landscape around that. Obviously, there’s cost to distribution, and so we need to think together how can we work to simplify that distribution together.

And where maybe in the past 10 years, we’ve seen a spirit of fighting each other, of eliminating one party or another, I think we should enter a time where we’re much more aligned on working together on trimming down costs and making distribution simpler together, because I think we all benefit from that, rather than just trying to make money among many layers, trying to simplify that.

Justin Schuster

It makes a ton of sense. I think all parties play a vital role. We want all parties to continue long into the future and make sure that as the dust settles around a new infrastructure for travel, that that continues to be the way that the industry functions. As I was thinking a little bit more about your customers, I think a big focus for JTB is the mid market companies and some that have a multinational footprint.

How are you seeing that part of the market evolve?

Geert De Boo

Yeah, I think we’re in a very exciting space actually. A couple of things that we see changing. Coming out of pandemic, I think everybody was very surprised, excited to see that particularly mid-market SMEs were the first ones to spend on travel again. And we have seen sort of exciting changes in a mid-market space where companies are more flexible.

The enterprise space is obviously a great space to be with large spend, but it’s also very saturated space where we see most of the changes in the mid market, global multinationals that may not have the large enterprise spend, but that still have a footprint around the globe are looking to consolidate often their spend, they’re forced to look at cost.

They want to leverage their spend in terms of supplier relationships. And so we see a consolidation in the mid-market space. And that’s really where we’ve been and where we’re focusing on to help companies in that global mid-market space to help them simplify things, to help them in that process of consolidating, of driving down costs, of ensuring a seamless experience wherever their travelers are, reducing the fragmentation of TMCs that they’re working with.

So, and that’s really where we’re focusing on. We have that footprint, we’re present in, have the ability to provide Spotnana in 25 countries this year. And so with the Spotnana technology to make it really easy also to launch and manage a program globally, I think we’re really entering a new era where it was a pretty heavy lift to launch a global program and now we’re making it a lot easier, which I think is what the market needs and what really fits into that changing dynamic of mid-market consolidation of travel programs.

Justin Schuster

Fantastic. It’s great to hear that Spotnana’s technology is helping to accelerate deployments. I know that a big focus for us this year in particular is to build out more capabilities to help TMCs reduce the cost of servicing. And as you think about that, where do you see the biggest opportunities for cost savings?

Geert De Boo

Yeah. This is a super important topic for, I guess, every TMC, but for us too, right? With the post pandemic, there are fewer skilled people, and salaries are higher. So everybody’s looking at how can we do things more efficiently.

For JTB, first and foremost, efficiency can never reduce the level of service, because that’s really what is so important to us. I started with that but that’s why it’s actually so important to have the right tools that you can still have a very high level of service, yet work very efficiently and reduce all kind of manual processes that typically exist in our industry. So I think it’s both that the existing agents can work more efficiently. Just think about simple things as exchanges, which is a lot of the things that they do. The right technology should make that a lot easier. And so it drives their booking efficiency. That’s one thing.

The other thing is that the right technology makes it easier for less skilled people, junior entrants, to come into the workforce. That has lots of benefits. Obviously it’s a cost benefit, but it actually brings a lot of new energy and new ideas into the workforce and a tool that makes it very intuitive to book travel without having to learn all kinds of code and commands, it makes it so much easier for our team select JTB to bring those new people into the workforce.

So the existing workforce working more efficiently is very important, but also the ability to more easily skill up with less skilled people because you have a platform that enables them.

Justin Schuster

Absolutely, makes a huge amount of sense. I think we’re also imagining that as the traveler is able to do more things on their own, there might be fewer reasons to reach out to an agent. Then the overall number of transactions that a TMC can handle with the same number of agents continues to get larger and larger. When you think about AI and other technologies that are playing a role in that, and you think about how technology can make agents also more efficient. How do you think the TMC will evolve in the future? What are your thoughts on the future of the TMC?

Geert De Boo

Yeah, that’s a big question. I wish I could predict the future, but coming back to that efficiency, you’re right. And we see it actually, right? The proof is always in the pudding. And when we compare our online adoption rate in our traditional booking tools or in Spotnana now, we make a jump from about 80 to 95%, which is huge if you think about the reduction in staff costs.

And AI may actually even enhance that and make that further. So is there still a role for human beings in a TMC or is it basically just technology? I definitely think that a travel management company like JTB Business Travel, we’re becoming more and more of a technology company where for us, we have the philosophy to work with the best and latest technology rather than ourselves developing it. That’s why we’re excited about a partner like Spotnana.

But AI is definitely going to enhance those capabilities already there. It’s going to probably, even for things where agents are now responding, AI is going to help to even reduce that ability. Does it completely replace human beings? I think not, and maybe I hope not.

113 years of human history of where humans make the difference in servicing, I think will probably retain some of that. And we always like to say, technology is great for when things go well, but humans are perfect when things go wrong. And it does happen. We still have to do in travel with things that are unpredicted, are difficult to resolve with algorithms.

It’s so nice when something goes wrong just to hear a real human voice. I’ve had that experience too. Like we have a proactive approach to disruptions where we contact travelers, you know, something is going to happen and there’s nothing like hearing the voice of an agent that says, I know that your flight’s disrupted. I know it’s canceled. I know you’re stuck at the airport. I’ve already looked into options. This is what it can do for you. Or even just, know, I know you’re in a difficult situation. How can I help you?

There’s just nothing like that human interaction when you really need it most. So 95%, 96%, 97%, 98%, yes, I think technology can do an amazing job, but I certainly hope that we remain in a world where we have human beings. That’s part of the TMC that I think is still important, but beyond that, more than ever, and we discussed all those things, all those changes in terms of fragmentation of content, changes in distribution, changes in how companies globally procure, et cetera.

In all those things, I think TMCs remain a key partner. And AI can help to make TMCs better at complex equations. A simple example is when a traveler makes a booking, there are different interests. There’s the interest of the traveler. He has his or her preferences in terms of what he likes to book. It’s a human thing. Then we have the company who has financial interests. They want to make it as affordable as possible or whatever. And then there’s a TMC interest. We need to make money too. As a human being, it’s quite complex to bring that equation of those different interests together and always make the right choice of where that is.

AI can [bring] all those interested to bring those together, find the right point that makes the most parties as happy as possible. And I think that makes me really excited, when you combine that with then that human touch when it’s needed, where it can really be a powerful force to make the traveler experience way better and make us all happier in terms of the financial equation too.

Justin Schuster

Well, that’s a vision for the future that I hope we get to in a short amount of time. And maybe just to wrap things up, since this is The Travel Is a Human Emotion Podcast. Could you share your own reflection on the connection between travel and human emotions?

Geert De Boo

Yeah, my first thought would be obviously as me personally as a human being loving travel, having been privileged to live and travel around the world, lived on three continents, I’ve always been traveling, been lucky that my parents forced us to cross borders and then discover new cultures.

It’s really part of my DNA to continue exploring. But more than that, I believe very much in travel to make a better world. I really believe that when we strive to build connections and bring people together across cultures, it creates a better, more stable world. We saw during the pandemic when suddenly we couldn’t travel and all those walls between countries almost literally went up again.

I’m quite passionate about seeing my job and making sure that our corporate clients can travel that actually make us a better world, a more peaceful world, a more connected world, a more flourishing world commercially, financially, economically, but also culturally. So I’m quite passionate about that part of my job enabling that. And I see that in our people too.

I joke sometimes to our people, right? If you really wanna make a lot of money, you shouldn’t work in the travel industry. But I see that people really have that passion too. They love servicing people. They love to enable people to get together and build businesses. And so I see a passion in our people that goes beyond just doing their job.

And they really have a passion for travel, either to have a challenge themselves, or at least they really are driven by making sure that their travelers can connect with other people around the globe. And I think that is something that, again, maybe touches upon where it’s not just technology, that’s a human thing that’s somehow given to us that we are different when we’re together with other human beings. so that part of us bringing human beings together is really important to me and to the people in JTB.

Justin Schuster

Well, wonderful. Thank you so much for spending time with us today. Thank you for being a guest on our podcast. And we really appreciate your time and your insights. Thank you.

Geert De Boo

Absolutely. Thanks so much for having me.