SITA moves Travelsky to IP platform

Disaster recovery data centre created in preparation for Beijing Olympics

China GDS provider, Travelsky Technology Ltd. has announced that SITA is carrying out major improvements to its technology platform including the installation of a disaster-recovery data centre in Beijing as the country gears up for the 2008 Olympic Games.

Airlines around the world are expected to increase the number of flights arriving in Beijing by over 70% during the Olympic Games. It is estimated that air traffic will peak three days before the Games Opening Ceremony on August 8 and three days after the closing ceremony on August 24 with an average of 1,900 flights per day compared to the usual average of 1,150.

Wang Ying Chun, Travelskys Chief Financial Officer, said: We are working with SITA to ensure that foreign carriers can have the best possible links to their airline reservation systems.  We are also setting up a disaster-recovery data centre to ensure reliable back-up support to airlines during the Olympic Games.

We are not taking any chances. SITA will provide separate WAN connections for this data centre to make sure all network connections with other GDSs and airline carriers can be switched over to the disaster recovery centre in the unlikely event of any failure in the primary data centre.

The SITA IP VPN service which SITA is now installing at Beijing International Airport is a managed, business-class network service that provides customers with secure and reliable IP-based Virtual Private Network (IP VPN) solutions. IP VPN allows customers to subscribe to a single, unified connection for their corporate intranet, business-to-business extranet, and public Internet requirements.

Rene Azoulai, SITA Senior Vice-President for Communications Services, said: SITA has a proud record of supporting the air transport industry in the preparation for major events like the Olympic Games. As well as replacing legacy network connections with a more reliable IP-based platform, we will introduce several other improvements which will include operational messaging; an airline community network already used by the STAR alliance and others for airline host to host communication.
 

About SITA

SITA is the world's leading service provider of IT business solutions and communications services to the air transport industry. SITA manages complex communication solutions for its air transport, government and GDS customers over the worlds most extensive communication network, complemented by consultancy in the design, deployment and integration of communication services.  Its broad range of airline and airport IT applications and services includes airport operations and integrated baggage services, common use and desktop services, flight operations and air-to-ground communications and end-to-end airline distribution and fares services.

SITA has two main subsidiaries: OnAir, which is leading the race to bring in-flight mobile telephony to the market, and CHAMP Cargosystems, the world's only IT company solely dedicated to air cargo. SITA also operates two joint ventures providing services to the air transport community: Aviareto for aircraft asset management and CertiPath for secure electronic identity management. In addition SITA sponsors .aero, the Internet top level domain reserved exclusively for aviation.

SITA covers 220 countries and territories and the head office is in Geneva, Switzerland. SITA had consolidated revenues of US$1.481 billion ( 1.194 billion) in 2006.