Travelport, a global travel services provider, and top car rental firm Hertz International recently held two workshops highlighting the latest car rental trends and opportunities in Jeddah and Riyadh for local travel agents.

More than 30 of Saudi Arabia’s leading travel agencies learned about ways to maximise their business through the car content available on Travelport’s Global Distribution Systems (GDS), as well as the latest offers from Hertz.

According to the two companies, both events – the first of their kind hosted by Travelport and Hertz in the Middle East – were well received by local travel agents and have set a precedent for similar initiatives in the future.

“Travel content such as car rental is a key part of the Travelport offering, and the workshops we organised with Hertz really helped us highlight the business opportunities available to travel agents in Saudi Arabia,” said Assita Kone, hospitality business development manager, Middle East, Travelport.

“We’re thrilled with the response we’ve received from the local travel trade and are planning to make these events a regular feature in Saudi Arabia – and across the region – in 2014.”

Chris Bradley, GSA – Saudi Arabia & Bahrain, Hertz International, said: “Travel Agents are our valued partners and it was wonderful to see this terrific response. Initiatives such as these are designed to boost our long-term outbound strategy focusing on key growth channels and will play an instrumental role in our long-term success. We are looking forward to building on this great start and are grateful to Travelport for their partnership on this.”

Travelport’s Galileo and Worldspan GDS systems currently offer deals from 24 global car providers representing 30,000 locations, ensuring that travel agents have the best choice available, and are able to complete entire itineraries – including air travel, hotels and cars – through the same booking system.

Travelport also caters to online travel agencies (OTAs) by providing an efficient way to search and display relevant car content on their website. This is enabled by Travelport’s cutting edge Universal API technology, which allows agents to access a wide range of content as well as apply individual parameters to guarantee relevant search results. – TradeArabia News Service