Amadeus hailed a “coming of age” for budget carriers as Ryanair announced its return to the GDS after 10 years.
Ryanair flights will be bookable through Amadeus from November 1. Diane Bouzebiba, Amadeus UK and Ireland managing director, said: “It really was time for us to work together, but it takes two to tango. We’ve been trying to get the right conditions to get Ryanair back since the day they left [in 2004] and we were constantly pushing our airline distribution colleagues to make Ryanair an offer they could not refuse.
“We had to prove our technology worked and Ryanair had to realise what we could offer them to reach high yield customers.”
The deal is timely because Ryanair launched flexible Business Plus fares at the end of August, which it expects to drive GDS sales. Ryanair rejoined the Travelport GDS in April.
Ahead of the Business Plus launch Lesley Kane, Ryanair’s former head of corporate travel and groups, said GDS bookings remained “a very small percentage of Ryanair sales”.
The latest deal means all but Ryanair’s special offers – about 90% of fares – will be available through the Amadeus ‘light ticketing’ platform, along with the full range of ancillaries.
Bouzebiba said: “The three lowest fares will not be available via any GDS – about 10% of Ryanair’s overall capacity. However, all those fares are gone two to three weeks prior to departure.”
Travel Weekly revealed in August that Ryanair was poised to announce a deal with a second GDS.
Bouzebiba said: “There has been a coming of age on the part of the low-cost carriers. We have 70 low-cost carriers in the system.”