KK Birla travel firm plans rapid growth

The K K Birla Group is planning to gain more traction in the corporate travel business through group company Lionel India which has joined Global Experts in Travel (GET). The company expects to grow by 20-25 per cent from its 2003-04 turnover of Rs 91 crore.

GET is a global travel management joint venture with over $ 2.6 billion in annual travel sales. Lionel India Limited was till recently known as Rosenbluth Lionel India Limited and represented the Rosenbluth International brand in India.

Last year, when Rosenbluth International was acquired by American Express, Lionel India, along with several former Rosenbluth partners, set about jointly identifying opportunities for the creation of a new global travel brand.

GET is a culmination of this initiative. Lionel represents Michigan based GET in India and is also a shareholding partner.

GET's US partner is Total Travel Management, a $ 1.2 billion corporate travel management company. This company has acquired several patents for its on-line booking tools in the last 10 years.

"As a result of joining GET, by the end of this year we expect to have three global clients. These are usually very large accounts. Currently, we have 110 customers, of which nearly 18 are global accounts. Our focus will be on transnational companies that are setting up shop in India as well those Indian companies looking at overseas opportunities," Gaurav Sundaram, director Asia-GET and CEO of Lionel India, told Business Standard.

While Lionel India has already acquired retail foreign exchange licences for its Kolkata, Mumbai and Delhi offices, it is also making a small beginning in the car rental business for corporates and is in the process of acquiring its first fleet of cars for this business.

"By the second quarter of 2005, we intend to be a full-fledged travel management and consulting company. We expect our business to grow at the rate of about 30 per cent over the next three years when we intend to touch revenues of Rs 200 crore," Sundaram added.

Since Fortune 500 companies spend a lot on travel, Lionel India will help its clients reduce travel costs by standardising processes.

Synchronising and integrating the India operations of companies with their global travel programmes will be the way forward. GET's combined technological resources and travel consultative expertise is estimated to reduce a corporation's annual global travel expenditures by up to 30 per cent.

Following Rosenbluth's takeover, the K K Birla group's corporate travel business faced the threat of losing nearly 60-70 per cent of its global accounts. However, the company eventually retained all its global accounts.

"At present there are 12 former Rosenbluth partner countries that have signed up for the new joint venture called GET. They will have to operate their corporate travel operations under the brand of GET. We will have only one partner per country unlike some travel consortia that go for multiple partners. By March 2005, we plan to have 20 partners who will have an equal stake in GET," Sundaram added.