April 02, 2004

Lufthansa Systems today announced that the Czech low-cost airline Smart Wings has been successfully using the Internet Booking Engine (IBE) from Lufthansa Systems since mid-March. An essential feature of this integrated low-cost solution is the ability to make bookings directly online with the IBE, independent of a global distribution system (GDS). The FrontSales solution also offered by Lufthansa Systems can be used as an additional distribution channel for direct bookings through a call center.

The Internet Booking Engine provides Smart Wings with the best possible way to handle their reservation and passenger data using a cost-efficient distribution channel, thus enabling the low-cost airline to save considerable distribution costs for each booking compared to booking through a GDS. On the Smart Wings website, visitors can immediately check flight availability, book their flights, and pay by credit card. In this process, Smart Wings uses the Fare Quotation module for automatic price calculation. These functionalities are handled entirely by the powerful IBE from Lufthansa Systems. Just a few days after the system went into operation, Smart Wings reported over 200 Internet bookings, as well as more than 100,000 queries for available seats.

For sales through their call center, Smart Wings uses the FrontSales solution from Lufthansa Systems. FrontSales includes a user-friendly interface oriented on business processes that enables efficient customer service in the call center. The high-performance Inventory System from Lufthansa Systems allows the airline to control its flights professionally. Reservation data can also be analyzed flexibly by means of a user-friendly reporting application.

"We are very pleased that immediately after completion of the low-cost solution, we were able to acquire Smart Wings as our first customer. Using our complete sales solution consisting of the IBE, Fare Quotation and the Payment module, the Czech low-cost airline can now handle ticket sales entirely online," said Gero von Götz, Vice President Business Segment Airline Solutions at Lufthansa Systems.

Smart Wings, a subsidiary of the charter airline TravelServis, will start offering flights from Prague to Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Madrid, Zurich and Paris starting May 1, 2004.

Note to editors:

Lufthansa Systems is one of the leading IT service providers for the airline and aviation industries worldwide. As systems integrator, the wholly-owned subsidiary of the Lufthansa Group covers the entire range of IT services, including consulting, development, implementation and operation. Lufthansa Systems provides its IT infrastructure and operations services to a variety of industries. Headquartered in Kelsterbach near Frankfurt/Main, Germany, the company has branches in Germany and thirteen countries and employs about 4,200 people worldwide.