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American signs contract with Galileo; talks with Sabre stalled

July 10, 2006 |

American Airlines has signed a five-year, full-content agreement with Galileo International. American now has content agreements with Galileo, Worldspan, G2 SwitchWorks and Farelogix, but has yet to announce pacts with Sabre and Amadeus.

Galileo and American Airlines signed a five-year, “full content agreement” under which the airline designates Galileo as “a competitive distribution channel for American Airlines ticket sales,” Galileo said.

That means Galileo has signed long-term agreements with American, US Airways, United, Delta and Continental. Galileo doesn’t have a new pact with Northwest, but negotiations are under way, officials said.

American now has content agreements with Galileo, Worldspan, G2 SwitchWorks and Farelogix, but has yet to announce pacts with Sabre and Amadeus. The latter two GDSs signed a mutual aid pact to funnel airline content to one another if a carrier exits one of the systems, and American vehemently opposes that agreement.

In fact, American is not in active negotiations with Sabre, according to American spokesman Ryan Mikolasik. Their existing DCA-3 (Direct Connect Availability-3) agreement expires July 31.

“To date, we have not been able to reach a competitive distribution agreement with Sabre, and we are not currently in active negotiations,” Mikolasik said. “We plan to provide them with full content going forward, but are not discussing a new contract at this point.”

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