Hotel Online Special Report


Passkey Goes Global
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Opens Office in Dublin Ireland, Lyon Convention and Visitors Bureau
First European City to Become Passkey-enabled
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QUINCY, Mass. ­ November 19, 2002 ­ Passkey, North America's meetings and conventions standard for group hospitality management and distribution, has entered the worldwide marketplace with the introduction of Passkey International, Inc.  The European arm of the company kicked off operations last month with the addition of the Lyon (France) Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB) to its Passkey-enabledSM  global network.  Citing a desire to add this state-of-the-art technology to the city¹s already successful meeting business, the Lyon CVB has taken the lead in introducing Europe's professional congress organizers (PCOs) and hotels to a "new way" of managing group business on the international circuit.

Tim Durant, executive vice president of Passkey International, observes, "Our move into the worldwide marketplace is a natural progression for us and fits nicely with our other expansion plans within the global community.  We have been hearing for some time from international meeting planners and CVBs the need to access our timesaving functionality and robust technology.  We waited until now to make absolutely certain that we could seamlessly service and expand our capabilities to serve this important market."

The first Passkey International office opened in Dublin, Ireland, early in the summer of 2002.  Its primary responsibility is to serve as a springboard, outreaching to other parts of the continent and beyond, as well as focusing on customer support and consulting on group meetings management.  In anticipation of this growth, Passkey has initiated discussions with a number of technology companies in the European marketplace to form strategic alliances that will provide an even firmer foothold internationally.  To complement this strategy, Passkey has revamped their corporate Web site www.passkey.com to include French, Spanish and German versions.
The system is perfectly suited for the European conference and exhibitions market because it can easily adapt to meet a client's unique business requirements.  With a focus on building efficiencies across all platforms, Passkey, now available in multiple languages, is the ideal tool for hotels, meeting planners, CVBs, and PCOs that seek an easy-to-access, user-friendly and fully integrated housing solution.

By using Passkey¹s universal platform, all parties involved in an event are able to access a centralized system (24-hours-a-day, 7-days-a-week) and can share and respond to consistent, real-time reservation information.  Benefits of this ability include the capacity to search, book, modify and even cancel reservations; easy access to information on a destination and its area hotels; and receipt of automatic confirmations that are customized in a variety of languages.  Most importantly, Passkey facilitates and enhances full communication and reporting capabilities between all parties to ensure cost-effective management and success of all group events of any size.
Bruce Redor, chief executive officer, Lyon CVB, notes, "Passkey lets us easily embrace the newest and best technology for managing group business while, at the same time, unifying all our constituents.  We are looking forward to working with such a well-respected and knowledgeable group."

The move globally entailed providing intricate functionality that was specific to the demands of the worldwide marketplace.  These enhancements were designed to meet the extraordinary standards already established by Passkey domestically.  "The best part about this expansion is that we can show the rest of the world what has made us so successful here in the States," Durant says.  "It also gives our technicians a unique set of challenges to solve that we can likely use to further enhance our system here in the United States," he adds.

About Passkey:
Passkey (www.passkey.com), the industry leading ASP solution for group reservations management and distribution, provides all channels of this industry¹s planning process with better, more efficient ways to manage events.  The Quincy, Mass.-based provider empowers users with web-based applications that provide all parties with real-time reports and updates on every facet of the planning process.  Industries served include Convention and Visitors Bureaus (CVBs), Global Distribution Systems (GDS), hotels, travel agencies, associations, corporations, meetings RFP engines and registration vendors.  Travel providers who are Passkey-enabledSM can also leverage Passkey technology to manage group housing for both citywide 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).

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Contact:

Passkey
Dahlia El Gazzar 
Marketing Director 
voice: 617-237-8238
email: [email protected]
http://www.passkey.com
 



 
Also See: Boca Resorts, Inc., Selects Passkey to Further Serve Meeting and Event Planners / Oct 2002
Omni Hotels First to Implement Passkey Enterprise Solution Across Entire 40-Property Portfolio / Oct 2002
PGA of America Hits the Green With Passkey / Aug 2002
Nothing But BlueSkyz and Passkey / Sept 2002
Jay Ramadorai Joins Passkey as Senior Vice President & Chief Technology Officer / July 2002
Passkey Names Former Hotel Executives Paul Rantilla and Andrew Mace to Sales Positions / April 2002 


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