Engine has acquired Options Travel, a corporate travel management company with more than 30 years of operating experience. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
Options Travel will continue operating independently under its existing brand and leadership. All of the company’s employees will join Engine following the acquisition.
Engine and Options Travel began working together approximately nine months before the deal. Engine said that collaboration highlighted limitations in the legacy software used by corporate travel management companies.
Engine is now developing an AI-native online booking tool for travel management companies that combines reservations, payments, reporting, customer administration and traveler safety functions.
The platform will provide travel agents with a single dashboard covering their entire client base.
Engine said consolidated workflows can reduce booking times to as little as 2.5 minutes, compared with an industry average of nearly 15 minutes based on a Forrester study cited by the company.
The system will personalize travel searches using each customer’s negotiated rates, policies and preferences. It will also flag situations requiring agent attention without requiring manual review across every client account.
Engine plans to make the technology available to travel management companies throughout the industry rather than limiting it to Options Travel.
More than 1 million travelers and over 33,000 businesses use Engine’s travel and spend management platform. The company is backed by Telescope Partners, Blackstone and Permira.
KEY QUOTES:
“TMCs are the relationship experts at the center of the industry. The technology behind them hasn’t kept up.”
“Working with Options Travel showed us exactly where it falls short. TMCs deserve modern technology behind them, and that’s what we’re here to bring.”
Elia Wallen, Founder and CEO of Engine
“Joining Engine lets us help build what our industry has been waiting for: real technology, for every TMC that’s been underserved by legacy software.”
Brett Buynack, General Manager of Options Travel
