EgyptAir will use IBM Watson Assistant to develop an AI virtual agent to help transform their travellers' shopping experience
IBM office in Beijing, China. (Credit: Cory Denton/Wikipedia.org)
EgyptAir Tourism and Duty Free has signed an agreement with US tech major IBM to scale and modernise its back-end operations by migrating to IBM Cloud.
The airline will also leverage IBM Cloud to host its SAP Travel Retail System.
As part of the cloud deal, EgyptAir will also use IBM Watson Assistant to develop an AI virtual agent to help transform their travellers’ shopping experience.
The virtual agent is expected to enable its customers to do online shopping, including order placement, payment and delivery inside the plane.
IBM Cloud general manager Harish Grama said: “In choosing a hybrid cloud approach and migrating to IBM Cloud, EgyptAir can provide its customers with a secured and enhanced retail experience.
“IBM has decades of experience driving transformation within the travel industry, and looks forward to helping EgyptAir modernise their operations to meet the needs of today’s customer.”
The deal enables EgyptAir to utilise IBM’s security capabilities that include confidential computing and encryption capabilities to control access to its data.
As part of the agreement, the airline will migrate its ERP workload to IBM Cloud, with a hybrid cloud approach provided by the technology company.
Separately, online car rental provider Booking Group has also selected IBM Cloud technology and services to speed up its digital transformation.
With a presence in the online car rental business for 12 years, Booking Group provides its services in more than 150 countries.
The company planned to move its critical workloads, including booking reservations and financial reports, to IBM Cloud to remain flexible.
The migration was also aimed at accommodating the fluctuating demand for car rentals in local markets, adjust prices and availability as required.
The deal with IBM is expected to allow Booking Group to securely deploy workloads and manage its public cloud infrastructure, with IBM Cloud and IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service.