HEDNA Distribution Management - Group Subcommittee Seeks to Enhance Automation

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. October 14, 2008

FALLS CHURCH, VA, December 20, 2005. The Distribution Management - Group Subcommittee of the Hotel Electronic Distribution Network Association (HEDNA) has announced ambitious initiatives for 2006. Their goal for the upcoming year is to address and enable the standardization and automation of the group booking process and to provide an ongoing, educational resource for all HEDNA members.

The current Group booking environment is primarily manual in process, coupled with several automated information management tools to gather, retrieve and select group venues. Semi-automated environments such as OnVantage (www.onvantage.com) and others provide both buyers and suppliers a turnkey solution for enhanced visibility, greater product selection control and compliance and actualization. The Distribution Management - Group Subcommittee will work on processes that will match the right product with the right buyer and ideally lower expenses and measure results throughout the process.

"There are immediate opportunities to optimize the online Group booking process. Our subcommittee's objective is to integrate existing and future booking technologies to create an online Group booking community", said Ed Perry, Director of E-Commerce, WORLDHOTELS, and Distribution Management - Group Subcommittee Chair. "We will work with traditional and non-traditional distribution partners, including third-party online booking engines. We envision a community that has integrated inventory and instant availability access from the supplier to allow end-consumer, travel agents and meeting planners to shop their properties on a 24/7 basis."

As part of their ongoing research, the Group Subcommittee will actively engage the key constituencies of the Group travel booking process: hotel and meeting venue suppliers, meeting planners and coordinators, travel agents and travel management companies, end consumers, GDSs and alternative GDS solution groups and Internet service providers. Detailed strategies and action plans were distributed to subcommittee members last week, providing a solid roadmap for 2006.

HEDNA President Jimmy Suh remarked, "Ed Perry and his team are demonstrating the HEDNA mission in action: using current and emerging technologies to solve the distribution challenges that afflict an important segment of our industry. The end result of the subcommittee's work will be a more efficient and cost-effective way to conduct Group business. We applaud their enthusiasm and hope the entire hotel industry will cooperate with their ongoing efforts."

HEDNA members may learn more about Group subcommittee and how to get involved at: http://www.hedna.org/cmte.cfm#ids

About HEDNA

The Hotel Electronic Distribution Network Association (HEDNA) is a not-for-profit trade association whose worldwide membership includes executives and managers from over 200 of the most influential companies in the hotel distribution industry. Founded in 1991, all of HEDNA's activities are intended to stimulate the booking of hotel rooms through the use of GDS, the Internet and other electronic means. HEDNA brings all segments of the hotel industry together to evolve systems and services into electronic distribution that is easy and efficient. Additional information on HEDNA is available by calling +1 703 970-2052 or by visiting www.hedna.org.