Business Travel Is Starting to Slowly Return
Business Travel Is Starting to Slowly Return
(Bloomberg) -- A senior executive at SAP SE, owner of one of the world’s largest travel expense management platforms, expects it to take until at least 2023 before revenues from its Concur unit return to pre-pandemic levels.
After losses for Concur during the pandemic, the service is seeing an uptick for bookings and transactional revenue, Chief Financial Officer Luka Mucic said in an interview.
Mucic said that transaction volume -- which includes fees for extra usage of Concur -- was on the rise. He expects Concur to return to pre-pandemic growth rates next year, although it will take until 2023 at the earliest to revert to those levels in absolute sales terms.
“Customers in the wake of the pandemic and the far reduced travel volumes are tiering down their fixed committed contracts,” Mucic said, adding that despite the smaller deals, “Concur actually had a very strong bookings performance in Q3. They grew again in sizable double digits.”
Airlines have pinned their recovery hopes in a return to business travel, encouraged by the recent U.S. decision to allow vaccinated air travelers from Europe to enter the country.
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