EADS, the European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company, has reported significant annual savings of over €5 million in its corporate travel budget as a result of using KDS’s travel management solution over the past three years. KDS Corporate has been widely adopted within EADS and now handles over two thirds of its business travel. Through improved travel booking decisions and reduced TMC costs, KDS Corporate has allowed EADS to reduce average booking costs by 15 percent and its total travel spend by 30 percent.

 

“We wanted a tool that would be easy to implement, need minimal resources, yield a fast return on investment and would greatly simplify our day-to-day life,” says Michael Doerr, Director, Travel Management, EADS. “With KDS Corporate we found a solution that satisfied all these requirements.”

According to KDS, KDS Corporate offered EADS an end-to-end solution for business travel bookings that spanned travel authorization, the enforcement of corporate policies, efficient self-booking and comprehensive management information. By embedding KDS Corporate within EADS TRAVEL.net, the company’s own travel management portal, EADS achieved a seamless integration with its wider travel and expense systems and thereby delivered enhanced travel policy compliance.

“Linking the booking and accounting processes enabled us to reduce complexity and achieve an improved workflow on

all levels at EADS. This led to lower manpower requirements which in turn resulted in further cost savings,” explains Frank Fullbeck, Sales Director, KDS Germany.

Commenting on the success achieved over the initial three years, Michael Doerr says: “Thanks to KDS Corporate we have made a lot of progress and are well on our way to achieving our goals. Adoption rates are as high as 80 percent in some departments and we have seen total cost savings of 30 percent. KDS has proved an extremely effective tool and we are now well equipped to deal with the rising business travel costs that are forecast for the coming years”.

EADS is shortly to upgrade to KDS Corporate V6, the latest version of KDS’s market technology. EADS expects its enhanced expense management feature to contribute to even greater user adoption and further cost savings of 10 percent.