Skift Take
Now that Hogg Robinson Group is out of the picture because of a merger, Australia's Corporate Travel Management is one of the largest public corporate travel management companies in the world. It's setting its sights on expansion in the U.S., but entering the market has its challenges.
The race is on across corporate travel to offer a standard level of service regardless of the region a traveler is visiting.
For U.S. companies, this means looking to Asia, particularly the red-hot Chinese business travel market. But for travel management companies based in Asia-Pacific, the last few years have seen continued growth in North America as the worldwide business travel has become a powerful force.
Australia's Corporate Travel Management, in particular, has been looking to parlay its success in its home region into a larger global footprint. With its U.S. operation based in Colorado, the company has been slowly ramping up its North American business.
"It's funny being a global company," said Jaimie Pherous, founder and managing director of Corporate Travel Management. "They tend to fail, particularly because they try to make everything vanilla and standardized, and usually, they over-govern, so they lose that ability for local leadership. They don't empower them to make agile, quick decisions, which is what you need."
Skift spoke to Pherous about the company's ambitions in the U.S., the challenge behind building a truly global travel service network, and why corporate travel giants are so bad at building technology solutions that really work for travelers.
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
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