ITA Software Blog

Find flights while on the go

2012-02-21T15:23:00.001-06:00

(Cross-posted on the Google Inside Search blog)

Planning trips is fun and exciting, and ideas for where to go on your next adventure can strike you when you're in the most unexpected location. Last week I met a friend for coffee, and he told me about his recent trip to Maui. His story and photos inspired me and I immediately made a note to myself to check flights to Hawaii at home.

Since we launched Flight Search back in September, we’ve been hard at work improving the features, increasing coverage and making it easy to find flight results directly from google.com on your desktop. Starting today, we're also making it easier to find flights departing from the US on your mobile device.

For example, when you search for [flights from Chicago to Daytona Beach] you’ll see a table that shows available flights, including duration and prices. You can adjust dates on the page, or click any flight to further research and book your trip.

The Flight Search feature on mobile browsers offers all the benefits of Flight search on desktop:

Find flights quickly with results that load instantly and a list that’s easy to scan
Discover places to go on a map - see ticket prices for various destinations by surfing the map. You can filter by price, airline, or flight duration.
Find the best time to go - Click the calendar icon to see what dates will get you low prices.

The feature is available on Android and iOS devices. To learn more about the Flight Search feature, see our tips at http://www.google.com/insidesearch/flights.html.

Posted by Gus Prevas, Software Engineer

Customer relationships are key

2012-02-02T13:54:00.000-06:00

Each year we interview our QPX™ pricing and shopping customers to find out what we do well and where we need to improve. Since we started the survey in 2007, we’ve seen satisfaction with our products and service climb. We were especially pleased that this year’s survey yielded strong results. 100% of participants were somewhat or very satisfied with our QPX pricing and shopping products, and 96% were somewhat or very satisfied with the service we provide. One customer said that while there is always room for improvement, the service gets better every year -- from the engineers to the technical support staff to the customer-facing team.

While it’s great to hear the positive feedback, the real value is in what we do with the suggestions for improvement. Our internal teams look forward to hearing the survey results and are focused on coming up with creative solutions to address any suggestions identified by our customers.

My hat’s off to all the teams that focus on making our products even better and giving our customers the tremendous support that keeps them so happy. We’re committed to listening to what our customers want and partnering with them to make them successful. I think that’s what makes these relationships so strong.

Posted by Eli Sanders, Director, Technical Account Management and Customer Support

Find hotels by travel time

2012-01-24T14:58:00.000-06:00

(Cross-posted on the Google Inside Search blog)

Have you ever wanted to visit somewhere while on vacation and realized that getting there from your hotel would be a real trek? Wouldn’t it be great if you could specify how close you wanted to be to that place when searching for a hotel?

Last year we introduced Hotel Finder, an experimental tool to help you find hotels, and today, we’ve extended its functionality with a new way to search: ‘Hotels by Travel Time’. Now if you go to Hotel Finder and enter [Empire State Building] in the search box, you’ll see the hotels that you can get to by public transport within 20 minutes.

The areas you can easily reach from your point of interest are spotlighted on the map. If 20 minutes is too long to travel or you like to get around on foot, you can easily change the travel time or your mode of transport (e.g., walking, transit). The map will update automatically to show a new spotlighted area and the nearby hotels. You can also drag the red pin to find hotels near other places you might like to visit.

This feature is not only for tourists. You might be travelling on business and want to make sure you can get to the office or that conference center. Check out this example of hotels near [Canary Wharf, London].

As well as searching by travel time, you can define your own area to search within (choose “Hotels in selected area”) or find hotels in a city’s most popular locations:

To try it out, simply go to Hotel Finder, search for a city or a point of interest and select “Hotels by travel time”. Keep in mind that Hotel Finder and 'Hotels by travel time' are experimental and filtering by transit time is only available in cities where we have partnered with local transit agencies to integrate their data into Google Maps. We’d love to hear what you think: just click the “Send Feedback” link in the right-hand corner of Hotel Finder.

Posted by Konrad Gianno, Software Engineer

Talk with the experts in our new Matrix and OnTheFly discussion forum

2012-01-18T10:30:00.000-06:00

Many expert flyers use our powerful Matrix and OnTheFly search tools to help find the perfect flight. In Matrix, you can use our advanced routing language, calendar view, and multi-city search to construct the right search to meet your needs. OnTheFly gives you a streamlined mobile interface to help you narrow down your options quickly.

Today we added a new discussion forum to help users get even more out of Matrix and OnTheFly! The discussion forum provides a venue for all users to get help from a large audience, including Googlers with both an extensive knowledge of Matrix technology and the airline industry, as well as external Matrix and OnTheFly mavens. It’s a space where power users can share tips with one another and learn how other people are using our products.

Interacting with our users in the forum will help us get to know you and your priorities even better. The forum will also supplement our recently revamped help content for Matrix and OnTheFly as a knowledge repository of tips and tricks for getting the most out of our products.

We hope you’ll drop by the new forum and leave us a note!

Posted by Jacqueline Dozier, Consumer Operations

Roll the dice with VEGAS.com

2012-01-11T12:30:00.000-06:00

It’s Vegas baby! From the lights of the famous Las Vegas Strip to world-class entertainment to celebrity chefs to the Hoover Dam, Vegas has something for everyone.

And the crew over at VEGAS.com are experts when it comes to what to do in Vegas. They offer amazing Vegas travel choices, from air packages to hotels to shows to tours to front-of-the-line nightclub passes and beyond. More than 2.5 million unique visitors visit VEGAS.com websites each month. VEGAS.com even runs the concierge desks at Las Vegas Resorts. They’re that plugged in! And now they’re making it easier to fly to their beloved city.

In November 2011, VEGAS.com launched our airfare pricing and shopping system QPX™, to help travelers quickly and easily find the best airfare deals available on their website.

Welcome to the family, VEGAS.com.

To learn more about ITA by Google visit www.itasoftware.com.

Posted by Mike Mo, Senior Business Development Manager

Boston Googlers give back in 2011

2011-12-30T11:21:00.001-06:00

In the spirit of giving, we wanted to take a moment to reflect upon some of the good deeds our Boston Googlers have done over this past year.

Held a bone marrow registration drive with the Gift of Life
Hosted a charity drive to benefit Japan earthquake and tsunami relief efforts
Designated a week to GoogleServe where Boston Googlers joined 8,000 Googlers company-wide to do good in our local communities
Provided national grants to MIT’s OEOP MITES program, to the Boston Museum of Science and to Citizen Schools
Collected non-perishables, and donated time and money to the Greater Boston Food Bank
Worked with Bikes not Bombs to promote the use of bicycle technology as an alternative to war and environmental destruction
Worked with the Charles River Conservancy to help keep the Charles River clean
Fed our veterans at the New England Center for Homeless Veterans
Educated kids on the math behind the Rubik’s Cube at the Cambridge Science Festival
Sponsored the MIT KBPS, a music and engineering student organization that restores, documents and maintains the musical installation/sculpture at the Kendall T stop
Raised funds to help care for local Boston women and children at Rosie’s Place
Delivered meals to the critically ill and homebound through the annual Thanksgiving Pie in the Sky fundraising event
Donated time and talents to Citizen Schools
Launched Age Engage where Boston Googlers trained Boston seniors on Internet search and email. Watch the Age Engage Google Ireland video to learn more about this program

While this represents only a small portion of the charitable efforts made by Googlers around the world, we wanted to acknowledge the kind hearts and minds of our Boston-based team! You can find out more about Google giving in 2011 on the Official Google Blog.

Posted by Sarah McManus, HR Business Partner

Looking for somewhere to go on New Years Eve?

2011-12-22T12:30:00.000-06:00

Looking for something fun and different to do this New Years Eve? Thinking about heading out of town, but not sure where to go or if you can afford it? Consider using Google’s Flight Search feature to help you plan your domestic trip in the U.S. with just a few clicks of the mouse.

Just enter your departure city, preferred dates and set your price limit. For example, let’s say you’d like to depart from Denver on December 30, returning January 1, and want to spend less than $350. Enter this information and the map will automatically update to show you where you can go. Solid blue dots represent the places you can visit for under $350 on the dates you’ve specified. Clear dots represent possible destinations available from Denver that exceed your $350 price.

Our team is working hard to make features like this that are fast and easy. For more tips on other ways you can search for flight information, check out the Exploring travel options video below or visit our Inside Search blog.

Posted by Noam Ben Haim, Senior Product Manager, Travel

Star Alliance FareFinder app now available across all mobile platforms

2011-12-20T12:30:00.000-06:00

The Star Alliance FareFinder app can now be used on Android, BlackBerry and iPhone. The free flight search app, powered by ITA Software by Google, lets travelers search, find and shop for the best airfares for domestic and international trips across all 27 Star Alliance member airlines. It can be used by frequent flyer members and non frequent flyer members. FareFinder enables you to quickly find the best flight and offers an option to book your preferred flight directly from your mobile device.

Find out more about FareFinder and how to download or access the app on the Star Alliance website.

Posted by David Peller, General Manager, EMEA/India/Asia-Pacific

Now Google Maps makes it easier to find your way through the airport

2011-12-07T12:30:00.000-06:00

Many of us will travel hundreds of miles to visit family and friends this holiday season, and it’s likely we’ll find ourselves in an airport or two. We might even find ourselves stuck on a layover wondering where our gate is or trying to find our favorite coffee spot. The good news is Google Maps 6.0 for Android has a new feature that can help. Google Maps recently added floor plans and the ability to see where you are on the map when you’re indoors, for several U.S. airports, making it easier to find a gate or grab that cup of coffee.

For more information, watch this video and visit the Lat Long blog.

Posted by Scott Ciabattari, Strategic Partner Development Manager

See flight results right on Google.com

2011-12-01T19:30:00.000-06:00

(Cross-posted on the Google Inside Search blog)

Back in September, we launched an early look at our Flight Search feature, which was developed to help people find faster, more flexible, and more useful results for online travel searches.

Flight Search results have been available by clicking on “Flights” on the left-hand navigation bar on the search results page, or by going directly to google.com/flights. But we’ve heard from you that you’d like to see more options to find flights and prices even more easily and quickly.

Starting today, we’ll begin showing flight information right in your Google search results on certain flight related searches. For example, if you search for [flights from San Francisco to Las Vegas] you’ll see a table that shows available flights, including duration and prices. You can adjust dates on the page, or click any flight to be taken to Flight Search to further research and book your trip.

Over the next couple days, you’ll start to see the flight results appear for searches whose origins and destinations are currently supported by our Flight Search feature. In the short term, those results are limited to domestic US flights. The flight schedule feature will continue to provide information about nonstop routes around the world and across 11 languages.

Once you've booked your flight and are on your way, if you're traveling through one of the many U.S. airports whose floor plans we recently added to Google Maps for Android, you can easily see where you are and what's around you from the convenience of your mobile device.

Happy travels!

Posted by Emmet Connolly, UX Designer, Flight Search

H.I.S. differentiates their online travel presence with ITA

2011-11-23T16:00:00.000-06:00

H.I.S., one of the largest Asia-Pacific multinational travel agencies, wanted to make it easier for customers to plan travel online. They also knew they would need flexible and advanced airfare shopping tools to complete a critical project to reengineer their booking platform. After careful evaluation they chose our airfare pricing system, QPX™.

On November 15, 2011, the H.I.S. and ITA teams successfully completed the first phase of the project, launching QPX live on the H.I.S. consumer website, his-j.com.

With its global headquarters in Japan, H.I.S. is considered a leader in the retail agency domain. They have more than 280 walk-in outlets in Japan, with more than 108 branches in over 84 international cities.

Kiyoshi Takano, executive officer and general manager, information system division, H.I.S., said “I’m delighted to have selected and now deployed ITA Software. QPX will help us differentiate our online shopping experience, by offering more innovative and comprehensive airline products -- regardless of the point-of-sale.”

We’re looking forward to working with H.I.S. as they expand their global online presence.

To learn more about ITA, visit www.itasoftware.com.

Posted by David Peller, General Manager, EMEA/India/Asia-Pacific

From Istanbul to the entire globe, Turkish Airlines makes it easier to plan travel with QPX™

2011-11-22T12:30:00.000-06:00

(Cross-posted on the Google Turkey Official Blog)

Turkish Airlines just signed a multi-year agreement with us to use QPX, our airfare pricing and shopping technology. They plan to use it for revenue and reward redemption pricing and shopping, as well as ticket exchanges and refunds.

The rollout will take place in phases, with the first release expected in Q3 2012. When launched, Turkish Airlines customers will be able to use the same advanced airfare shopping tools across all channels -- whether they shop turkishairlines.com, agency websites, the THY Mobile Application, or by visiting one of their ticket offices.

When we asked Turkish Airlines why they selected us, Mr. Adnan Metin, senior vice president, corporate development and CIO, Turkish Airlines replied, “The flexibility of QPX will let us roll out more advanced features, faster, and consistently across all of our channels. Ultimately, this will make travel planning much easier for our customers and will improve our revenues.”

A Star Alliance member, Turkish Airlines is the fastest growing and fourth largest European airline. They are the most recent airline in Europe to take advantage of our technology to enhance the overall shopping experience for their customers while driving sales and slashing distribution costs.

To learn more, visit www.itasoftware.com.

Posted by David Peller, General Manager, EMEA/India/Asia-Pacific

Learn more about Flight Search with three quick tips

2011-11-16T14:28:00.001-06:00

(Cross-posted on the Google Inside Search blog)

With the holiday season closely approaching, you might be looking to book flights to visit friends and family. With our Flight Search feature, you can plan your trip quickly and easily with just a few clicks of the mouse.

In response to interest from you, we’ve shot three short videos to share some of our favorite ways the Flight Search feature can enable you to explore travel options. For example, you may know you want to travel and have a set budget, but you’re not sure where to go. You can also easily see when to fly in order to get the best deal, and you can use a scatterplot to view the entire set of results to more easily compare all flight options at a glance.

Hope these tips help you spend less time worrying about booking your flight and more time preparing for the holidays.

Posted by Marcin Brodziak, Software Engineer, Flight Search

American Airlines amplifies results with Boombox™

2011-11-15T12:30:00.000-06:00

Travel companies work hard to make finding deals easy online; however, developing their websites can require a significant investment of resources and time.

That’s where our Boombox platform can help. It’s a middleware system that offloads much of the technical burden for travel companies. This means new airfare shopping features can go from concept to prototype to production more quickly -- and with fewer resources.

American Airlines launched Boombox last year and they’ve added several new features to AA.com since. The first addition was making their price and schedule matrix the default shopping flow. This change made it much easier for travelers to evaluate price differences between fare classes, which led to an added benefit for AA - a higher number of sellup conversions.

They also used Boombox to launch AAdvantage DealFinder, a pricing and shopping feature that makes it easier to provide more targeted offerings to their travelers.

American Airlines has been a customer since 2004 and an early adopter of many of our products. In addition to Boombox™, American Airlines uses QPX™, Reward Shopping, ReShop™, DACS®, and most recently ITA Merchandising.

“American has steadily built its relationship with ITA because we align in key areas such as vision, leadership, and innovation,” said Monte Ford, the senior vice president and technology and chief information officer at American Airlines.

Check out the full case study to learn more about the results AA has achieved so far, with Boombox.

Posted by Nate Nottke, Senior Technical Account Manager

Top three reasons StudentUniverse uses QPX™

2011-10-25T12:30:00.000-05:00

When StudentUniverse, the largest student travel deals site in the United States, wanted new airfare pricing and shopping technology, they knew exactly what they needed:

Cost savings,
A better shopping experience for their travelers, and
A partner who could adapt to changing customer needs quickly and reliably.

We strove to meet all three of their needs. Firstly, within the first month of switching to our QPX airfare pricing and shopping system, StudentUniverse saved tens of thousands of dollars as a result of lower query costs and efficiencies in searching.

Secondly, StudentUniverse travelers can now shop for the lowest fare within a +/- 3 day window of their preferred departure or arrival date. This makes it easy for students to figure out the cheapest way to go on winter break, spring break, or semester study abroad programs.

Finally, because we’re working so closely with them we’re able to anticipate peaks in volume when students are planning for these events. We can add new servers and expand capacity within only a few short weeks to handle the increased traffic without interruptions.

Check out the full case study to learn more.

Posted by Harriet Holcomb, Technical Account Manager

OnTheFly™ 1.2 for Android just made it easier to plan your trip

2011-09-30T12:35:00.001-05:00

We just released the latest version of our airfare shopping mobile app for Android. One of the new features in OnTheFly™ 1.2 is the flexible date search that allows you to browse 35 days of potential departure dates on a calendar combined with an interactive price graph.

You can also save and access search history now, including particular itineraries of interest. We’ll even check price changes for those itineraries so you can know the best time to plan that dream trip.

Designed to demonstrate the comprehensive search abilities offered with our QPX™ airfare shopping engine, OnTheFly makes it fast and fun for you to compare options across airlines, dates, and alternate cities/airports.

If you haven’t already tried OnTheFly, you can download it for free from the Android Market or App Store. OnTheFly for use with BlackBerry (OS 4.6+) can be accessed at http://bbmatrix.itasoftware.com.

We’re excited about the response to OnTheFly so far, both from our first time and loyal users! Keep sending us your feedback and suggestions.

Posted by Stefan Frank, Product Manager

Welcome to our blog

2011-09-30T12:35:00.000-05:00

It’s official. The ITA Software by Google Blog is now the only place you need to check for all ITA news.

Starting today, this blog will be our primary source for making customer and product announcements, providing company updates, offering guest essays, and giving you unique tips from our experts. So if you’re curious about ITA Software -- please check back often or subscribe to our RSS feed.

Posted by Cara Kretz, Sr. Manager, Marketing, Communications and Public Affairs, Travel