WorldTravel BTI Reaches Out to Touch the Global Market

The parent company of WorldTravel BTI is re-landscaping the corporate travel battleground with a couple of acquisitions and the decision to sever a longstanding partnership.

BCD will acquire TUI´s business travel subsidiary and a majority stake in The Travel Co., and will combine it with WorldTravel BTI to create the third-largest travel management company in the world.

Hogg Robinson and BCD have agreed to pursue independent strategies regarding new business and have signed a service agreement covering existing client contracts under the BTI brand.

BCD Holdings, a Dutch family-owned travel and financial services company, will create a new travel management brand by patching together WorldTravel BTI with TUI´s business travel subsidiaries and a majority stake in U.K.-based The Travel Co.

The purchases of TUI´s corporate travel business and The Travel Co should be completed in March. The TUI transaction is subject to regulatory approval.

If approved, the move would create the world´s third-largest travel management company, with $8.5 billion in annual sales, behind American Express and Carlson Wagonlit Travel.

The new brand, under a single management, would employ more than 10,000 people, and operate on five continents. The TUI portion of the transaction contributes $3.5 billion in sales, and The Travel Co. pitches in $500 million.