Airlines are missing out on savings because there is little co-ordination between their various negotiating teams, Hamish Broom, Sabre Travel Network's supplier relations director said.
He said Sabre had evolved from being a GDS and travel distributor into a travel technology company but many travel suppliers still had an "outdated" view of what it offered.
Mr Broom said carriers often had separate teams to negotiate on GDS rates, to negotiate with online travel agencies and to negotiate with suppliers of operational and decision-support technology.
"In many cases there is little cross-over or co-ordination, between these teams," he said.
He said a team from one airline, which wanted to cut its GDS fees, was offered savings on operational and support technology to the value of twice the amount they wanted off the GDS fee.
But they turned it down because their only remit was to negotiate a cut in GDS fees.
"This happens all the time," Mr Broom said. "Are the guys at the top of these organisations aware of just how much they're missing out on by not evolving their supplier negotiation processes at the same rate as we are evolving our overall offering?"
He said the Belgian carrier SN Brussels Airlines had just signed a "bundled arrangement" which gave Sabre access to its full content over many years while SN got operational and decision-support tools from Sabre Airline Solutions.
Mr Broom said Sabre was also expanding its hotel offering with several new products, including Cross-sell, Up-sell and Recommended Rate coming onto the European market this year. No date has yet been fixed for a fourth product HOD Highlighter to come onto the European market.
Lufthansa to expand jet service
Lufthansa is to extend its private jet service into Russia and possibly into the Middle East, the US and Asia Pacific regions.
Mr Thierry Antinori, the German carrier's vp marketing and sales, told a press conference at ITB Berlin that the service, launched a year ago "had come up trumps."
He said the service had ten bookings daily and was able to serve 1000 European airports.
He said demand had "far exceeded expectations" and Lufthansa was now considering extending the service.
Mr Antinori also said the airline would extend its low fares concept launched in Hamburg and Dusseldorf last year.
He said the idea where fares started at 99 would "definitely" be rolled out in other areas.
* Karl-Ludwig Kley, Lufthansa's chief financial officer and a member of the airline's three-man executive management committee, has resigned. Mr Kley, 45, who joined the airline in 1998, is reported to be joining Merck, the pharmaceutical company.