American Express Global Business Travel (No. 3 on Travel Weekly's 2019 Power List) has added four new
investors to the consortium that owns 50% of the corporate travel management
giant.
Under the equity recapitalization, Carlyle Global Partners,
the University of California Office of the Chief Investment Officer of the
Regents, Kaiser Permanente and GIC (the government of Singapore’s foreign-investment
arm) will join the Certares-led investor group that owns half of Amex GBT.
Greg O’Hara, founder and senior managing director of
Certares, will continue as executive chairman of the GBT board of directors. Paul Abbott, who took over as Amex GBT’s CEO in September,
will continue in that role.
The new investors join existing Amex GBT equity partners
Certares, Qatar Investment Authority, funds managed by BlackRock and the
Teacher Retirement System of Texas.
American Express retains its 50% ownership stake in Amex
GBT, which was spun off into a separate entity in 2014 and currently is ranked
as the world’s largest travel management company, managing more than $35
billion in corporate travel annually.
Earlier this month, Amex GBT announced that president
Philippe Chereque would step down in March 2020, with Andrew Crawley assuming
the newly created role of chief commercial officer upon Chereque’s departure.
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Source: Business Travel News