Press Release 2003

Star Alliance selects SITA to create first global IP community network for an airline alliance 
 
Star Alliance, the world's leading airline alliance and SITA, the world's leading provider of network and communications solutions to the air transport industry, have signed an agreement to establish the first common alliance internet protocol (IP) communications infrastructure platform. The agreement represents another milestone in a series of recent cost savings deals between information technology (IT) providers and Star Alliance, negotiating collectively on behalf of its member airlines.

The agreement, the first of its kind between an airline alliance and a global network services provider, will ensure cost-effective and transparent IP connectivity to all of the Star Alliance member airlines. host systems. This represents a major milestone towards the further integration of IT as this common communications infrastructure will present substantial cost savings opportunities for the Star Alliance member airlines.

"At Star Alliance we continue to focus on exploiting our inherent economies of scale while facilitating the cooperation and integration of our member airlines ," noted Michael Stagl, Star Alliance vice president and chief information officer. "With its airline focus, know-how and global reach, SITA is best positioned to help our members realize yet another benefit of being a part of Star Alliance."

"We expect to deliver increasing savings for the carriers of Star Alliance as they embrace the Extranet's vast opportunities to boost operational efficiency," said Bruno Frentzel, executive vice president and chief commercial officer, SITA. "SITA's IP-Virtual Private Network (VPN) technology is yet another means of showing the savings potential that IT provides for the air transport industry: delaying investments in IT can over time be a much more costly alternative over taking a timely decision to invest."

Under the agreement, Star Alliance will work with SITA to create a common, shared IP based community network platform, to be known as Extranet 2. Designed specifically to meet the needs of Star Alliance, SITA.s IP-VPN solution will ensure that all staff can transparently connect to all 16 member airline host applications and operational systems at another 21 global locations.

"The new network not only brings significant cost savings for Star Alliance members, but also provides a route to access a number of common value added services," added Logan Nathan, Director Airline Alliances, SITA. "By adding voice, messaging, hosting and security services we can enable further savings in the future by offering additional opportunity for consolidations amongst the members."

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