Kayak Pushes Off Into Corporate Meetings
Skift Take
The popular travel search engine arm of Booking Holdings is betting that its polished user experience can lure corporate clients into managing business events on the platform.
Kayak for Business, the corporate travel platform from travel search engine Kayak, today launched a new feature called “Events,” designed to help companies plan and manage event travel at scale. It is intended to centralize event travel booking, enforce corporate travel policies, and give planners visibility into each attendee’s travel plans.
The feature is available to existing Biz+ and Enterprise customers. The company did not disclose pricing, whether it will be sold as a standalone product, or if it will be available to smaller customers in the future.
“Coordinating travel logistics for business events can be a major productivity drain for organizers and attendees,” said Eva Fouquet, senior vice president of Kayak for Business. The company positioned the feature as a way to solve this corporate pain point by centralizing event travel and information.
"Events" allows companies set travel policies and payment rules, and invite up to 10,000 attendees using a single booking link. Attendees book their own travel with the feature supporting employees as well as non-employee travelers, including candidates, interns, new hires, and other guests.
Companies can also import or link events from existing event management tools into the tool, allowing planners to manage invitations, bookings, and attendee travel in one place, rather than duplicating work across systems. Kayak for Business said the product is powered by its existing travel content and direct API connections, but did not disclose specific supplier partnerships or duty-of-care capabilities.
The feature offers real-time dashboards showing invite status, RSVPs, booking compliance and travel details, with reports that can be exported for finance, HR, or compliance teams.
The Kayak for Business corporate travel platform launched in July 2021, with Skift noting the platform's limited support options at launch, despite being aimed at corporate clients that expect a high level of service.
In September 2023 the company announced a higher level corporate travel service for enterprise clients in partnership with travel payments and expense automation company Blockskye, which also manages the customer support. The service was born from a request by accounting firm PwC for Kayak to help manage its corporate travel program. PwC is now the platform's integration partner.
