Craig Murphy Chief Technology Officer Sabre Holdings

1. Perspectives on eCommerce Craig Murphy Chief Technology OfficerSabre Holdings October 2003

2. Agenda • About Sabre Holdings • Technology at Sabre Holdings • The Core and the Edge of eCommerce • Shopping in eCommerce: Technological Transformation • Landscape for Transformation • Leadership for Transformation • Summary and Conclusions

3. About Sabre Holdings

4. Who is Sabre Holdings? A global travel commerce company, providing travelproducts, services, and technologies to support travelers, travel agents, corporations, and travel suppliers

5. Sabre Holdings Owns Four Businesses

6. Technology at Sabre Holdings

7. Role of Technology Office • Defines the company’s technology direction • Plans the company’s strategic architecture • Performs company-wide operations research, consulting, and prototyping • Drives innovative application of technology to create new revenue and improve profitability

8. Corporate Approach to Technology Architecture • Roadmap • Consulting • Governance Research Innovation • Meta-process • Content • Customization • Channels • Revenue management • Dynamic pricing and packaging • Low fare search Technology Office • Support units • Business units • External bodies Relationships

9. Our Technology Roadmap Service-Oriented Architecture Innovation Decision Support Strategic Relationships

10. The Core and the Edge of eCommerce

11. Fulfill Book Shop INITIATION RESERVATION The Core: Content Provider for the Edge • Travel distribution business processes • Technology requirements: heavy lifting done here • Information = data + logic  technology simplifies 

12. Content is King Internet reach and range The Edge: Where We Touch the Content Shift Intuitive User Expert Agent Technology Empowers!

13. Shopping in eCommerce: Technological Transformation

14. Shopping in eCommerce: History and Context • Airline deregulation created fare competition • Managing fare data became important overnight • PC’s proliferated, creating robotic agents • The Internet further changed the user base • Computing power has exploded

15. Shopping in eCommerce: Transformations • Business opportunity exploded along with computing capabilities • Solutions have increased capabilities and reduced cost very quickly • Continuous “faster, better, cheaper” has led to DISCONTINUOUS CHANGE • ECL to CMOS hardware • Proprietary O/S and MW to open systems to open source • Point computing to complete inter-networking • Focused, but opaque solutions to simple, transparent solutions • Accounting value for agents to option value for shoppers

16. Landscape for Transformation

17. Evolution and Revolution Organization and standardization Metcalfe’s law Moore’s law Broadband connectivity Desktop empowerment

18. Hardware and Software • Advancement on different frontiers • Hardware broadly ahead of software today • Software frontiers • Software development continues as an art form • Standards unpredictable but basics hold • Free software and open source as major forces

19. Convergence and the End Game • Standards and convergence • Standards and commoditization • IT Doesn’t Matter, HBR article, May 2003 Simplification and Empowerment

20. Return on investment Innovation from investment Expect the unexpected Unsolved problems Computing Business Legal The Future of IT Value proposition

21. Transforming eCommerce improved search and packaging recovery from irregular airline operations safer and better customer care Travel DistributionInformation Technology easier fulfillment with digital devices changing role of expert agents more timely information on deals, especially at the last minute

22. Leadership for Transformation

23. E x e c u t i o n L e a d e r s h i p T e a m w o r k Problem Definition is Key to Leadership • Theory and strategy are most beautiful • Execution is most important • Execution needs Teamwork • Teamwork needs Leadership • Leadership skills are scarce but comprehensible The ability to quickly and clearly define the problem at hand is a fundamental leadership skill

24. Intro to Project Management • Leadership must respect project discipline • Three fundamentals: • Written scope definition and completion criteria • Formal management of change against documented scope and completion criteria • Regular and conclusive management of issues • Plan for mismatched, ever increasingimpedance all the way through the project cycle Two rules of thumb: • If I can understand it, it can work • Double the estimates

25. Hierarchy of Difficulties • Technical Problems: relatively easy • Political problems: medium difficulty • Emotional problems: hardest problems in leadership Success requires mastery at each level

26. Politics Means Effective Collaboration Fundamental Theorem of Politics Other’s needs form the basis of getting my own needs met Corollary 1 No problem can be solved alone Corollary 2 Communication is necessary Corollary 3 Conflict is inevitable Corollary 4 Conflict can be energetic and beneficial Best Solution: Everyone WINS!

27. Emotional Intelligence Basics of Emotional Intelligence Begins with self awareness and assessment Reaches beyond expertise Recognizes many perspectives Emphasizes teamwork and social influence of the individual Hard on the issues; Easy on the people

28. Summary and Conclusions Faster, Better, Cheaper, and More

29. Summary • Economies of scale from miniaturization • Commercial evolution causes convergence • Commercial successes tighten progress cycles • Disconnects exist between hardware and software advancements • Both commercial and technical factors govern advancements • Rate of change requires strong technical leadership

30. Conclusions • Exponential growth in hardware in near term • Many software challenges remain • New business models emerging • Research labs working overtime • More disruptive technology certain • Business impact to surpass technical impact

31. Questions and Comments