Companies must put ROI on travel costs – KDS

Companies must put a return on investment (ROI) price on the cost of business travel, IT company KDS said today.

Dominic O'Regan, its solutions consultancy director, said the total cost of a trip was calculated accurately and then weighed against the benefit of the trip to the company.

Speaking at the Business Travel Market in London, O'Regan said:  "Right now, when the economic pressures on every business are so intense, it is more important than ever before to avoid unnecessary - and unnecessarily expensive - travel.

"The first step in that process is to know the likely total cost of a trip before the travel plans are approved. Are you going to spend more travelling than you will generate when you arrive? I cannot stress enough the importance of ROI in modern business travel."

O'Regan said companies included air fares in their trip cost but left out items like TMS fees, lodge card spend and incidentals.

"You only realise the actual total cost of the trip after the event, by when it's too late to do anything.

"Perhaps you never truly realise the total trip cost at all. If you want to stop wasting money, you need comprehensive, reliable, easily-accessible and well-presented data from the very start of the travel management process," he said.

KDS Taps Oracle Exec To Lead Sales

Travel and expense management technology supplier KDS has hired former Oracle executive Dean Forbes to head its global sales and marketing team.

The former Oracle group vice president of project and portfolio management solutions joined KDS as executive vice president for worldwide sales and marketing, KDS said last month. Forbes said he aimed to strengthen KDS's position in the expense and online booking markets both in Europe, where KDS has its strongest presence, and globally.

"Over the next year, without being specific, we have some aggressive plans to grow the business," Forbes said. "We're certainly in a high-energy, growth mode."

Forbes also led sales for project portfolio management supplier Primavera, which was acquired by Oracle in 2008, and Forbes said that role would inform his work with KDS. "This was a company that had not maximized its position out in the marketplace," Forbes said. "We were able to both globalize and localize that company and enter new markets over a very aggressive timeframe."

Forbes also has worked in management positions at both Motorola and Isis Communications.