Members of the agency consortium Advantage Travel Centres think that consolidation in the business travel sector will step up as the economy continues its recovery.
TMC bosses were surveyed before the organisation's annual conference, and many forecast that fewer business travel agencies would exist in the future, but that those in business would be far stronger.
Consolidation was predicted to scores of industry analysts when the UK economy began to stutter as a consequence of the credit crunch.
While a few deals were done, merger and acquisition activity was relatively non-existent, with many potential sellers not willing to do business while the value of their companies were so low.
But with many TMC owners having spend the last 18 months streamlining their businesses, it is no surprise that some companies will be in a good position to buy, while other are in a comfortable position to sell.
The question of consolidation was raised during an informal pre-conference survey of members, carried out to evaluate perceptions of the consortium.
Among its findings was that travel agents were focused on how they would adapt their businesses to future markets.
The group's members also believed their futures were secure, saying the demand for independent travel management companies would increase in the coming years.
However, smaller firms said they would find it difficult to battle against aggressive discounting by the competition and would need to battle with suppliers to get the best rates.