Press Release
April 18, 2001
QUINCY, MA -- Passkey.com, Inc. the leading provider of integrated Web-based group housing, and TravelCLICK, the
leading provider of electronic media and data solutions to the travel industry is introducing a new product, Passkey
Hotel Direct, for single property group reservations management.
Passkey currently provides online group reservations capabilities for managing city-wide events at 1,800 hotels
in more than 70 metropolitan cities. Passkey Hotel Direct, offers hotel properties an easy-to-use, economical web
application that allows them to compete more effectively for their share of the $120 billion meetings and convention
market.
Passkey.com, Inc. and TravelCLICK have entered into a long-term relationship in which TravelCLICK has added the
Passkey Hotel Direct product to its network of digital media and data solutions for TravelCLICK's global client
base of hotels. TravelCLICK will begin selling and promoting the Passkey Hotel Direct product to select properties
beginning April, and it will be formally introduced at HITEC in Orlando in June.
Passkey Hotel Direct Benefits
Using Passkey Hotel Direct, hoteliers and meeting planners will realize opportunities for enhanced revenues and
efficiencies that will reduce costs. Hotel Direct gives planners and hotels:
Hotels and Meeting Planners Share Data and Communications
``Passkey Hotel Direct was developed expressly to meet the needs of our hotel customers and their meeting planner
clients, which was to have a group management tool for single property meetings,'' said Tim Durant, Passkey Executive
Vice President and General Manager for North America. ``As a result, a key Passkey Hotel Direct benefit gives hotel
reservations departments and meeting planners simultaneous, immediate and direct insight into group room block
status. This enables both parties to see and share group room block information and performance, right up to arrival
- a benefit our city-wide customers already enjoy.''
Hotel Direct Automates and Enhances Reporting
Prior to Hotel Direct, hoteliers and meeting planners had a hard time tracking group rooms pick-up prior to the
cut-off date, when reservations were transferred into the hotel's reservations and property management system.
Many factors clouded the picture and sometimes even encouraged attendees to book outside the block.
Using Hotel Direct, attendees see a dedicated website for their group that lists only the negotiated group rates.
Attendees are not given the opportunity to shop for rates and book rooms outside of the group block. The website
allows them to enter their own data - reducing data transcription errors - and will ultimately allow them to make
changes in their reservations right up to arrival, with all transactions being recorded within the designated room
block. The result is more accurate reporting, better assessment of contract performance and comprehensive group
histories that can be depended upon as indicators of future performance.
Planners can rely on Hotel Direct reports on a 24/7 basis. Plus the automation processes of Hotel Direct improve
efficiency and reduce inaccuracies by eliminating the need to manually transfer group reservations data and supply
pick-up reports. This online reporting also ensures that meeting planners and hotels can work together, based on
an accurate picture and their own experience, to determine whether rooms should be added to the block or returned
to the hotel for sale off-block. ``By automating many aspects of the reservation process, Passkey translates the
benefits hotels now experience on the transient side of their business - which has been automated for nearly thirty
years -- to the group side,'' commented Durant. ``The result is that the group Sales and Reservations team can
devote more time building customer relationships instead of on manual reporting exercises, and ultimately making
their group business more profitable.''
Hotel Direct Helps Reduce Attrition
By improving the reporting response time and accuracy, Passkey helps reduce attrition, a problem that plagues even
the most seasoned hotel and meeting executives, who agree that under-reported and undersold group rooms cost hundreds
of thousands of dollars and prevent reliable forecasting.
Dave Lutz, Executive Vice President, Conferon Inc., a Passkey client and the largest independent meeting planning
organization generating more than 1.2 million room nights annually, commented, ``The ability to obtain and share
block information, in real time, for any Conferon meeting is a tremendous tool for managing the hotel's inventory
and limiting attrition and group wash. Many groups are interested in delivering online solutions to their attendees
to simplify the registration process, Passkey's online housing solution make all of this possible.''
Passkey Teams with TravelCLICK
TravelCLICK, which recently invested in Passkey and is the expert provider of digital media and market data to
the travel industry, will be the primary sales channel for the Hotel Direct product. ``By incorporating Passkey's
tools in the Travel CLICK arsenal of data management resources, our hotel and travel industry clients gain a significant
strategic advantage,'' said TravelCLICK co-CEO Ray Cohen. ``All the products we sell are about leveraging technology
and gaining competitive advantage. Passkey's Hotel Direct fits in perfectly.''
For more information about Hotel Direct, contact Passkey at 617-328-4800, visit www.passkey.com, or stop by the
Passkey Hotel Direct booth #953/951 at HITEC in the Orlando Convention Center, June 23-26, 2001.
Headquartered in Quincy, MA, Passkey.com, Inc. is the leading provider of integrated Web-based group housing and
travel solutions for the $120 billion meetings and convention industry. As a meetings industry metamediary, Passkey
provides Web-based applications for use by all key channels within the meetings and conventions industry, including:
convention and visitors bureaus, global distribution systems (GDS), hotels, travel agencies, associations, corporations,
meetings RFP engines and registration vendors. Travel providers that are Passkey-enabled(SM) can leverage Passkey
technology to manage group housing for both city-wide and single property meetings. Passkey investors include:
Lazard Technology Partners, Sabre (NYSE: TSG; www.sabre.com), Galileo (NYSE:
GLC; www.galileo.com), Worldspan (www.worldspan.com),
TravelCLICK (www.travelclick.net), DRV and McCord Group Travel Services
(www.mccord.com). Passkey.com also has hospitality industry alliances with
Pegasus Solutions, Inc. (www.pegsinc.com), cvent.com and PlanSoft Corporation
(www.mpoint.com).
Passkey-enabled is a service mark and ResDesk is a trademark of Passkey.com, Inc. Sabre is a registered trademark
of an affiliate of Sabre Inc.
TravelCLICK (www.travelclick.net) is the world's preeminent provider of
digital media and data solutions to the worldwide travel industry. TravelCLICK has established a unique Travel
Agent Media Network for electronically promoting special offers at the point-of-sale to 98% of the world's travel
agents, who combined book over $250 billion in travel services annually via their computer terminals. To further
extend the electronic marketing reach it affords its advertising clients, the company recently began building a
parallel Consumer Media Network. Formed in 1996 and headquartered in the Chicago area, the company has a rapidly
growing workforce of over 300 people spanning more than 140 countries, and maintains divisional offices in New
York City; San Francisco; Geneva, Switzerland; and Melbourne, Australia. Currently, TravelCLICK has over 5,000
clients in local markets around the world.
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Contact:
Dahlia El Gazzar
Passkey
617.237.8238
delgazzar@passkey.com
or
Stephanie Seacord
ISM
617.353.1822
sseacord@irmamann.com