What changes in the market should the partnership between SAP Concur and VoyagExpert announced on 5 October address?
Sébastien Delannoy - A few years ago, two distinct patterns coexisted within organisations: on the one hand, the travelWith the travel agencies and purchasing departments managing this activity internally, and on the other hand the expense, the expense accountFrom 2017-18 onwards, we saw a rapprochement taking place. This is the genesis of the partnership we are announcing today, because we are of course trying to keep up with our customers' developments and even anticipate them. Our customers, the two subjects were combined. Invitations to tender that initially only concerned travel have become intertwined with elements relating to expense accounts, and vice versa. As a result, our partnership management has evolved.
Why choose VoyagExpert?
Sébastien Delannoy - We asked ourselves the question a year and a half ago: what type of partnership would make sense to our customers, who have structured themselves accordingly, and present a united front? We audited travel agencies, from major international networks to more local structures, and we quickly realised that unfortunately it's not quite the same world in terms of service offering and proposals. So we turned to VoyagExpert for a number of obvious reasons: the agency had already developed a huge range of skills around Concur. VoyagExpert had brought on board a tool for booking travel, and had turned it into real expertise in IT, software and travel transformation management for its customers. As a result, it won a number of major accounts. There is also the certificationand investment in the training employees. This is a real strength, because offering something that few people are certified in, and bringing quality to the end customer, would have quickly discredited us. VoyagExpert combined these different criteria, and in the end it enabled us to create a partnership that is much more in tune with what the market expects. We are convinced that working with partners like VoyagExpert meets today's needs, but above all anticipates tomorrow's needs.
Concur calls it a "world first". Is the scope of the event, which looks like a simple extension of your partnership to a new "brick", really so considerable?
Sébastien Delannoy - This is a first in the sense that our major global agency networks, which represent a huge volume of business, such as American Express GBT, BCD Travel or CWT, do not have this positioning. It's effectively the addition of the expense report module to the travel module, which was already being used, because it's the 'natural' module for travel agencies. But this is the first time within the Group that an agency, and even more so a local agency, has been able to develop an global offer on every platform, in every region of the world. And even our biggest agency networks don't have that. That's why the development of the partnership is so important.
So is this partnership indicative of a profound change in demand?
Sébastien Delannoy - Until now, travel has been seen as a commodity within organisations. Today, particularly in France, it is increasingly seen as it should be: a building block in a digital transformation project. In this project, there are publishers, which is natural, but there are also players who were not considered legitimate until now, including travel agencies, who are now involved. Five or six years ago, a player offering an expense claim service, particularly an agency, was seen as completely illegitimate. Today, these players are beginning to take their place in this area because travel & expense management has really evolved within organisations.
How do you view the changing competitive landscape, with the acquisitions of American Express GBT, the integration of Expensya with Travelperk, and the withdrawal of Sodexo from Rydoo?
Sébastien Delannoy - In many cases, the consolidation we are seeing concerns travel agencies integrating technology. For one simple reason: that's what organisations are asking for these days. A service offering that includes a technological component. So there are two movements: travel agencies that want to integrate, acquire technology, and even innovate around this technology because they want to be a "TMCT", a Travel Management Company & Technology. At the same time, many local players, publishers of expense management solutions, have reached the end of a cycle. They realised that this involved a lot of investment and R&D, and the logic becomes complex when you're not backed by a major group. And there's a third type of movement: players who were far removed from this sector, such as the Sodexo group, which strategically was particularly affected by the crisis in the corporate catering sector, and realised that certain acquisitions were quite far removed from its DNA and reviewed its position. We have opted for a mixed approach: the link with the agencies is increasingly obvious, since it used to be a commodity and is now becoming a service offering with a technological brick, and so the natural players - even if there are few of them who meet all the criteria - are still the travel agencies. But there's a huge difference with a move made by American Express GBT, for example: we are convinced that being a software publisher is a real business in itself. As far as Concur is concerned, as part of the SAP world, we now have a presence in finance, purchasing and general management departments, with a whole suite of software including travel & expense. We have a huge capacity for investment and research and development in these products. This is all the more crucial given that changes in travel patterns have accelerated significantly compared with ten years ago.
Are other partnerships planned in the short term?
Sébastien Delannoy - By definition, we look at all the partnerships that might make sense for our customers and for the market, whose developments we try to anticipate. We are in a business sector that has come to the end of a cycle, and is reformatting. We are constantly on the lookout for new partners, provided that these partnerships genuinely bring value to the market and to our customers.
How did you get through these 18 months, and how did you cope with the fall in travel & expense transactions?
Sébastien Delannoy - Covid has obviously had an impact on us, to put it mildly... But we have brought our teams together and refocused them on our priorities: business development, customer support and customer satisfaction. Some of our offerings have accelerated incredibly fast. During the Covid period, many companies focused on one fundamental element: finding or recovering cash flow. One of our offers includes recoverable VAT, particularly abroad, which identifies all the pockets of VAT recovery within the travel business that companies are not using or are using very little. Before the crisis, this was an interesting subject, which may or may not have been a priority depending on the industry and the organisation. In times of crisis, it has become a fundamental element in identifying the slightest recoverable cash flow. As a result, we have seen enormous use of this tool.
Many players have had to reorganise or even reinvent themselves during the crisis. What about Concur?
Sébastien Delannoy - Being part of the SAP group has enabled Concur to better withstand the crisis, and we've managed to scale our teams to best support our customers. To such an extent that our relationship with them has been strengthened as a result. We have been two or three times closer in terms of frequency of contact. And we've been able to confirm and strengthen certain organisations that we were beginning to experiment with in certain markets, and which have now been put on a permanent footing.
Is the recovery on track, and are we seeing a return to pre-Covid volumes?
Sébastien Delannoy - We can make assumptions and projections, but no one can predict a return to the levels of 2019 or 2018. What is certain is that there will be a recovery. Since the course of 2021, organisations have been moving around again, visiting their partners and customers. More than 60% of travellers say they are putting pressure on their internal departments to authorise travel again. This is a strong point: some organisations may have underestimated the loss associated with no longer seeing these contacts. It's obvious that you can't do everything by videoconference. There are very strong signs on the European market, with the Business Travel Show and now theIFTM Top Resa. Events are picking up again, and the recovery is relatively sustained. Will it be linear or sinusoidal? What will be the crossover point with activity in 2019? I don't know. But it's clear that we're seeing a recovery in the market, particularly in France.
videoconferencing will reduce the volume of in-house travel and meetings
In the longer term, will videoconferencing replace some business trips?
Sébastien Delannoy - Indeed, videoconferencing will reduce the volume of in-house travel and meetings. Meeting fatigue is a very French phenomenon: companies used to hold a lot of internal meetings, not necessarily involving travel by plane or train. This is going to decrease, with the will of employees, and what they have discovered during the crisis, in terms of work-life balance, and also in terms of the usefulness of these meetings... On the other hand, while at the start of the crisis some people were talking about a reduction in overall travel of a third or even 50%, according to the discussions I have been able to have over the last few weeks, this will not affect meetings with customers. After 18 months of remote meetings, the organisations have taken stock and realised that we can't do everything by videoconference. And when there are negotiations or a new partner, you have to see the person you're talking to.
As the IFTM Top Resa kicks off this Tuesday, what is the prevailing feeling: impatience or uncertainty?
Sébastien Delannoy - This is very good news for the market and for all those working in the business travel sector. There's a real desire to get back in touch with our customers, partners and market players. So there's more impatience than excitement!
