Travelport is keeping its IPO options open, after pulling back on a public offering attempt in London in February, but subsequent developments in 2010 certainly haven’t improved its prospects.
Consider the following:
• United Airlines has given notice to Travelport that the airline intends to migrate from Travelport’s Apollo reservations system in 2012 to HP’s SHARES system. United is one of Travelport’s largest customers in the Americas. Although United likely would still be a customer for Travelport GDS and other services, the loss of United’s reservations system business would be a blow to Travelport. As late as April 2010, Travelport was saying it didn’t expect United to drop out of Apollo.
• Travelport is locked in an all-out distribution war with another major customer, American Airlines, and fears massive customer defections if American prevails in the airline’s disputes with Travelport and Orbitz.
Read the full story at:http://www.tnooz.com/2010/12/23/news/travelport-ipo-2010-developments-may-weigh-heavily/