James Governor at RedMonk had some interesting suggestions on how Sabre and the other GDS’ could improve travel agencies technology perceptions. One way to do that is opening up APIs, ala Amazon.com, Google, etc. which in turn makes it easier for others to participate – Sabre facilitating an Architecture of Participation – catchy phrase, great article.
Since the mid 70’s, the systems that support the GDS’ and the travel industry have evolved into complex and proprietary application environments. Only within the last few years, the GDS’ have begun to unravel the complexity by migrating applications to mid-range systems using commodity hardware and operating systems. While we still have a way to go, Sabre has made great strides in that space and has also embraced open source.
I think Sabre has begun facilitating an architecture of participation. We have published a series of web services. There are 22 services that provide base functionality - book flights, cars, hotels, create PNRs, etc. In addition to those, there are an additional 32 that provide enhanced functionality. While it’s probably not interesting to anyone not associated with travel, an overview of what web services Sabre offers as well as an index and explanation of each service can be found on our web services web site. My work group, Labs, is working with the web services team to find ways to streamline our processes and make it easier to consume those services.
We still have a good way to go and I believe that one path there is for Sabre to get into open and public dialogues with our customers. Our view of what’s best for our customers is no longer satisfactory.
