13 March 2018, Cochin: IBS Software (IBS), a global provider of new generation IT solutions to the air transportation industry has been declared winner in the corporate category at the recently concluded International Air Transport Association (IATA) NDC hackathon in Kochi, India. The IBS team created an app leveraging on gamification to give access to travelers to ancillary services at discounted prices for their return flight thus enhancing airlines’ loyalty programs. The software application conceived, developed and showcased by IBS was adjudged the best in airline retailing for the year so far by a jury comprising of professionals from the airline industry and independent technologists. The other participants in the corporate category included some of the proven names in the global airline technology space like Amadeus, LinkedIn, SpiceJet, Expedia, Infiniti Software, Atos, Revenue Management Systems (RMS) and TCS. IBS Software will now present the award winning app at an IATA event later in the year attended by senior stakeholders in the air transportation industry.
“Hackathons are a great example of how NDC, by modernizing the communication protocols between airlines and travel agents, create opportunities for new entrant developers to build innovative solutions around the NDC standard” said Yanik Hoyles, Director- NDC Program, IATA. “We are grateful to IBS Software to have hosted the NDC Hackathon in such a beautiful and unique venue”, he added.
“By hosting an event of this magnitude, IBS has proven its commitment and dedication to innovation and emerging technologies for the aviation industry. The IBS team had won the IATA hackathon in Dublin last year. This convincing win at this current edition testifies to the lateral thinking and disruptive ideation capabilities of our developers and architects”, said V K Mathews, Executive Chairman, IBS software.
This is the first time that IATA, which has some 280 airlines as members, organized the hackathon in Asia. The hackathon was conducted at the IBS Software premises in Smart City, Cochin over two days with nearly 150 participants from around the world competing in the ‘professional company’ and ‘start-up & student’ categories. Observers, API providers and other stakeholders involved in the event included representatives from nearly 25 companies including Amazon, Sun Express, American Airlines, SITA, Vanilla Air, Farelogix and British Airways. Over ten representatives of IATA from different offices world-wide attended the event.
IATA organizes New Distribution Capability (NDC) hackathons periodically to encourage fresh, innovative solutions to enhance airline retailing around the use of NDC API’s. The events serve as platforms to ensure the winning ideas have the potential to become robust, strong and successful business cases and to pitch these at industry forums for wider acceptance. IBS was also the winner in the hackathon edition held in Dublin in May 2017. The other corporate winners in previous editions were, Caravelo (Berlin), Amadeus (Dubai), App in the Air (Silicon Valley) and Ub Trippin(Paris).
