The second half of 2019 has flown by for all the Hitit Team; we were delighted to be your loyal technology partner and support our partner airlines to reach for the skies, not only with their fleet but also with their dreams and goals. Our hard work has once again been recognized by the industry and we were awarded “The Leading PSS Provider of The Year in Europe” and “The Leading Technology Software Provider in the Tourism Sector in Turkey.” We are delighted to be honored with these awards and celebrate this proudly with our community, which has grown by a further 10 new airlines from across the world.

 

At Hitit, we are grateful to be the technology partner in such a unique environment, whose members are some of the most significant players in the travel industry, an industry that is often faced with challenges. In fact, according to the year-over-year growth comparisons, 2019 was not the best year for the aviation industry. Many parts of the world faced struggles stemming from slowing economic growth, and unfortunately, some airlines were not able to survive the downturn. As well as global issues, each continent has its own challenges such as the recession in Latin America due to the currency weaknesses, high costs in Africa causing structural problems, inadequate improvements in air traffic capacity and management in Asia-Pacific, and a general economic slowdown in Europe. However, despite these there is hope for the 2020 forecasts as the current conditions of passenger demand and fuel prices, is positive.

The shining star of the travel industry is aviation, with its tremendous potential as more travelers prefer to fly to reach their destinations, meaning the industry will continue to expand. Hitit believes the key formula for success is to listen to the passengers, understand their demands, ease their journeys, and create multiple and smarter choices for them. Technology is your advantage, and we are always here to help our partners take the lead.

Hitit’s partners have continued to keep ahead of the game with Crane solutions surrounded by innovative technology, adapting to the latest industry updates and features, making business easier for the industry players. Let’s take a look at the new opportunities for 2020.

Stay tuned and follow us, we will be attending many events and will be happy to meet with you all year round.

Hitit continues to provide new-tech solutions, tools, and channels to enrich the travel industry. Hitit has begun to strengthen its Crane Agent Portal Plus solution with a redesigned look and feel with additional features. New elements have been added to provide seamless and cost-efficient sales opportunities for airlines, travel agencies and passengers. Crane.APP is currently available only in Pakistan; however, making the portal available in all the other countries of our partner airlines is our goal for the near future.

Hitit places an enormous emphasis on making air travel easier with its smart and new-tech solutions and services. After signing the technology partnership agreement with Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), Hitit has led the way in creating the digital transformation of the flag carrier, in record-breaking time. This valuable cooperation was followed by the opening of Hitit’s Liaison Office in Karachi, which was the result of observations made by Hitit of the lack of a comprehensive approach in the Pakistani travel market.

Following this experience, Hitit introduced the new version of the Crane Agent Portal Plus (Crane.APP) This new platform is designed to deliver the best experience for Travel Agency Users. Crane.APP accelerates the cooperation between travel agencies and PIA, providing added value and cost-efficient services for both, as well as the valued passengers. The Crane.APP provides significant benefits such as access to comprehensive fares, enrolling for training and become a certified trainer, creating bookings in a just few steps, participating in contests, and winning amazing prizes.

The new version of Crane.APP will be used by more than 2,000 travel agencies in Pakistan. In addition to the various new benefits, Crane.APP brings travel agencies together as members of the special community recognized in the travel industry. With its continuous enhancement cycle, Crane.APP is a unique turning-point platform for the Travel Industry in Pakistan.

After the upgraded version of Crane.APP came into service, Pakistani travel agencies began training in December 2019. For the first part of the certification program; reservation and ticketing staff users and main admin users from 40 travel agencies received training on the details of the Crane.APP, which provides seamless and cost-efficient sales opportunities. The five-day Training and Certification Program includes a 3-day post-training session for agency admins and a 2-day session for agency users. On completion of this certification program, the participants will be fully competent in the Crane.APP system for all reservation management and creation processes, PNR, ticketing, payment options, invoice management, sales reports and more. The program finished with a certification ceremony, with 40 participants receiving their certifications. 

The most effective way of building innovative solutions is the ability to ask the right questions. Hitit has been doing this for 25 years and has established itself as a permanent, reliable and trustable player among its counterparts in the global PSS marketplace. Hitit’s approach to the travel players demonstrates how well it knows the industry and the best way for its partners to benefit and grow their own businesses. With this in mind, we are confident that Hitit is a real teammate for its partners, listening and analyzing their problems and needs in accordance with the industry requirements. Hitit has completed its holistic point of view by developing services for the air cargo market.

 

Air Cargo by Numbers

Air Cargo is an important revenue generator for airlines and 9% of airline revenues comes from cargo. In 2018, Air Cargo revenue reached US$ 60 billion and carried 63.7 million tonnes. That was a growth rate of 8.6% in revenue and 4.5% in carried tonnes. If we look back at 2017, the potential of the air cargo industry could be seen clearly. A slowdown in the last two years, the volume in the air cargo industry is be expected to grow steadily, according to mid-term forecasts, estimating with the expectations over world trade capacity. During the next 20 years, cargo traffic is expected to more than triple, outpacing passenger traffic and offering airlines more opportunities to generate new revenue.

Crane Cargo: What have we done differently?

We have observed the needs and challenges of the marketplace, worked with the movers and shakers of the industry, asked the right questions, understood the expectations. At Hitit, we are very aware of what a leisure or business passenger expects from a journey, but we have not forgotten cargo and have kept ourselves one step ahead with our service offerings. With Crane Cargo solutions, we have developed the capability to locate, track, monitor, notify/alert, and respond/interact. Hitit has already created two modern turn-key cargo solutions serving both domestic and international cargo operations. The first is Crane DOM providing airwaybill creation and issuance, cargo rate management, barcode labeling and processing, flight assignment, premanifest and cargo manifestation, cargo arrival check-in, arrival notification and delivery, cargo tracking, and management reporting. Our second offering is Crane CGO (Reservation & Cargo Services) and covers all aspects of air cargo transportation from acceptance to final delivery, across the air logistics community. Both solutions are available as a SaaS model with an application hosted by Hitit and designed for all partners inside the entire supply chain.

In 2020, we will continue to create new additional and advanced cargo solutions which will cover the entire cargo process not only for airlines, but also for ground handling companies, general sales agents, and air cargo terminal operators.

Hitit’s corporate social responsibility project, Rackets Up has been continuing to grow and has quickly gained a positive reputation in Turkey. At the last event of 2019, Hitit took Rackets Up to Trabzon, a northern province of Turkey. Seventy-seven schools in Trabzon without table tennis equipment were provided with ping-pong tables and materials under the scope of the Rackets Up project. Combining equipment support with a professional training program, Rackets Up offered the 1st Level Coaching Classes to seventy-seven teachers in Trabzon. All the teachers completed the course successfully, received their certificates and have now started to train the children.

 

The Governor and the Mayor of the province, as well as members of the local administration, participated in the table tennis festival organized by Hitit. Hitit is involved in every step of the project in raising awareness of the benefits of playing table tennis. We are happy that Rackets Up has become an admired project. Indeed, there are very few projects which aim to bring sports to children for the welfare of the future generation, using a non-profit approach. Given the fact that social responsibility projects in the field of sports have generally consisted of sponsorships from the large sports clubs and facilitated by global companies to elevate their brands, the growing attention towards this humble project is easily understood and appreciated.

In this regard, we have received an invitation from Istanbul Aydin University to be part of the syllabus for students in the Communication Faculty of the University. We made a detailed presentation and explained the details of the project. Indeed, the attention for this project shows that Rackets Up is an inspiring case-study from the creation process to branding, from the collaboration of partners to putting the project into practice.

We will continue to attach great significance to fulfilling our responsibilities regarding the development of communities. Even though the project is new, we believe it will continue for many years in Turkey and be extended to other countries. We are excited to build a bridge between children and sport by means of table tennis, and we hope that as our partners, you will be a part of this meaningful project in the near future.

One of the highlights of 2019 for Hitit has been entering into the new business line of air cargo. 2003 was the first breakthrough year for Hitit, when the company started to develop the core airline solutions and offer a comprehensive one-stop-shop airline management suite. In 2019, Hitit has made another breakthrough, a big revolution for the company as we have built a new department hiring successful professionals, who have incredible experiences in the air cargo business. As the Head of Air Cargo and Logistics Solutions, Atilla Lise is a new member of the Hitit team. Let’s take a look at Mr. Lise’s background and his goals for the future of our new business line.

Graduated from Bogazici University, Istanbul in 1987 as a Computer Engineer, Atilla began his career in Turkish Airlines and worked as an IT Manager until 2000. He continued his work in Turkish Airlines as the Head of Turkish Airlines Cargo and was responsible for all Turkish Airlines Cargo operations including marketing, sales, network management, capacity planning, cargo pricing, revenue management, and cargo fleet development before getting promoted to Senior Vice President. In October 2018 Mr. Lise joined Hitit as the Head of Air Cargo & Logistics Solutions, bringing with him thirty plus years of experience in airline management, IT technologies, air cargo & logistics industry. In addition to holding an MBA, he also holds a PPL (Private Pilot License) Certification.

Delivering For Tomorrow – Customer Needs in 2020 and Beyond

“I joined the Hitit team in November 2018 after a long career at Turkish Airlines. Hitit is a very well-known hi-tech software company and a leading airline and travel IT provider in the aviation industry. As we know, airlines generate revenue by selling pax seats and cargo capacity to customers and companies. Passenger and cargo products are the main revenue generators of the airline. In order to give a full service to our partners, parallel with the one-stop-shop concept, we initiated a new project Crane CARGO. The main purpose behind introducing the cargo project to the aviation industry is to satisfy industry needs and requirements. Air cargo players are no longer satisfied with the current conditions, as their needs and expectations have changed. Clients expect a faster, more flexible and transparent service for their cargo shipments. The Air Cargo Industry is becoming more client-centric through digitalization and this is a key enabler for the development of new innovative services and solutions. Therefore, we are developing the cargo solution which is compliant with IATA StB Cargo initiatives (Simplifying the Business of Cargo) making air cargo easier, smarter and faster. Smart IT solutions are the key nowadays to ensuring the efficiency of logistic chains and data quality. Hitit’s Crane Cargo solutions are built to address the challenges of the modern Cargo industry. I am very confident that our Crane Cargo solution will open a new page in Hitit’s product portfolio, maximize customer experience, and create instant revenue.”

Have you ever played the ‘would you rather’ game? In case you haven't, this conversational game poses a dilemma in the form of a question beginning with "would you rather", usually followed by 2 equally horrible choices.

A year ago, Tappable turned this game into research and asked 500 males and females aged 18-34 what would they rather sacrifice to keep their smartphone. It turned out that 1 out of 10 people would cut off a finger rather than parting with their phone. 23% were even considering living without one of their precious senses, with the sense of smell being the popular choice among the five.

This digital addiction which, by the way, has an official terminology called “nomophobia”*, puts enormous pressure on businesses that struggle to keep up with the exponentially growing expectations of their users.

Mehdi MEZGHANI, the CIO at Nouvelair, shared his thoughts on the development process: "Thanks to a great cooperation with Hitit, we were able to successfully launch the update of our mobile app on Android and iOS. Designed by professional UX teams, this new version exceeded our expectations as it multiplied by 10.3 the turnover share achieved through this channel, tripled the number of downloads and improved its average rating. This franc success, born from the understanding of the needs expressed by Nouvelair and the professionalism of the team in charge of the development up this new App, was boosted by jointly agreed promotional actions. 
We will continue together to improve and perfect our App in order to allow our customers to have additional features and more user-friendly ergonomics.

With 6 more apps in production coming up in early 2020, our offering is like a living organism that keeps improving and growing with our addition of new functionalities to help our partners keep ahead of ever-changing user expectations and demands.

*Nomophobia: fear or worry at the idea of being without your mobile phone or unable to use it (Cambridge dictionary).