Skift Take
There's something appealing about a business model that makes money by saving other people money. So why is Amex GBT, the largest corporate travel management company, losing money?
American Express Global Business Travel (Amex GBT) said Tuesday it continued to pursue a two-pronged strategy as the world's largest travel-management company: maintaining its lead in serving multinational corporations while aggressively expanding into the fragmented small- and medium-sized business market.
The strategy led to measured growth in the third quarter. Transaction volume rose 9% year-over-year, while revenue rose 5%.
Yet the company posted a net loss of $128 million. It hasn't broken even since the pandemic.
The company said its cost-cutting program this year should generate $100 million in savings. The cuts were part of a three-year plan for cost reductions that began last year and included layoffs. The $100 million figure for this year was first quantified on Tuesday.
Adjusted EBITDA jumped 23% to $118 million, with 300 basis points of margin expansion.
Two-Pronged StrategyAmex GBT has seen share gains among two customer segments: large corporates and smaller players.
Amex GBT said it won $3 billion worth of new business (measured as "expected annual average total transaction value") over 12 months through September 30.
About two-thirds of that estimated value came from new small- and medium-sized clients.
Yet existing customer spending diverged across the segments. Global mu