06 Feb 2009
Utell� Expands Business Intelligence Offering With Rubicon

Utell / Pegasus

MarketShare to Provide Hotels with Historical and Future Competitive Performance Data

Utell Hotels & Resorts, the world�s largest provider of representation services for hotels has teamed with Rubicon, a leading provider of market intelligence reporting, to introduce MarketShare. This comprehensive business intelligence tool for hoteliers analyses a property�s historical and future business performance relative to its key competitors, providing the potential to improve revenue management.

MarketShare offers hoteliers a comprehensive suite of reservations reports. These reports allow tracking and monitoring of market demand trends for historic performance evaluation and future performance planning. Additional key features include measuring performance against the hotel�s competitive set, identifying potential sales and revenue management opportunities, measuring sales and marketing effectiveness, and indicating areas for improvement.

Ric Leutwyler, President, Utell said: �With the challenges facing the market today, it�s essential for hotels to understand their competition, recognize booking trends and identify gaps in demand so that they can react swiftly and appropriately. With MarketShare, they can now see how their properties are performing against the market in terms of room rates and bookings achieved, geographical sources of business, and even which travel agency or channel is producing reservations. As an added bonus, hoteliers can also view information on consortia/travel management companies� group bookings to help them measure their participation in corporate programmes, a must in today�s competitive environment.�

MarketShare provides two reports packages, both offering a unique view of a hotel�s business. �Historical� reporting enables a user to analyse hotels� and competitive sets� performance with unlimited agency and source country information year-to-date. �Future� reporting provides a detailed view of booking trends for the current month and up to 90 days in the future, enabling hoteliers to react to market conditions in advance.

Andy Storey, UK Managing Director, Rubicon said: �This forward-looking market intelligence arms hoteliers with the tools they need to drive revenue performance. MarketShare helps them to identify sales opportunities and to measure the performance of their sales and marketing programmes, offering them a distinct competitive advantage.�

MarketShare is currently available to all Utell represented hotels in the UK, Spain, Italy, France and Germany; with a February 2009 rollout planned for the rest of Europe, Canada, Mexico, South America, Middle East and Asia Pacific. A US rollout will follow in Q2 2009.

-End- About Utell� Hotels & Resorts Utell Hotel & Resorts is the representation business unit of Pegasus Solutions. This includes both the Utell and Unirez representation services which enable nearly 11,000 independent and small group hotels in over 130 countries to compete globally. Established almost 80 years ago, Utell is the world�s largest and most experienced sales, marketing and distribution service for hotels. With a comprehensive international portfolio that encompasses luxury, boutique, value, business and resort properties, Utell caters for a variety of accommodation requirements for both business and leisure travellers. Utell�s products and services are used by thousands of travel agencies worldwide in addition to major TMC�s and consortia groups. www.utell.com

About Rubicon� Rubicon (www.RubiconGroup.com) offers the broadest and deepest collection of market insight in the travel industry today. A leading provider of competitive market intelligence and market analysis to the global travel industry, Rubicon integrates competitive market information into the business planning and revenue management practices of its customers, including the top global hotel and rental car companies. Its flagship product, MarketVision�, offers a comprehensive suite of services that address market positioning in terms of price, demand and channel. Rubicon's publishing arm, IndustryIntel�, provides insights from the world's largest repository of future demand and cross-channel pricing data. For further information, please contact: Mandy Zakhour, Utell, +44 (0) 20 8490 4877 Mandy.Zakhour@pegs.com

Jennifer Sheran, Schroder PR, +1 404 872 7289 jennifer@schroderpr.com