Infographic — The Most Popular Passenger Service Systems

What makes the world go round? Some say love, some say money, but for airlines, it’s passenger service systems.

A passenger service system (PSS) is at the heart of an airline’s IT infrastructure. A PSS usually has a reservation system, an inventory system and a departure control system (DCS), making it critical to the end-to-end operations for airlines.

The reservations system allows airlines to sell seat tickets. The inventory system determines how many seats are available on a flight in different booking classes, while the DCS checks passengers in to a flight. But don’t be fooled by this simplified explanation — it’s a complex set of systems.

Even though there are dozens of PSS providers, only a select few are used by the majority of large airlines.

First we checked publicly available information to determine the PSS used by each airline. We also compiled the total available seat kilometers (ASK) for each airline. The total ASK per PSS determined the most popular providers across the world. We used the ASK data filed with air travel intelligence company OAG from the week of October 30th, 2017.

You can see the results in the infographic below. We cover the top 3 PSS providers per region, the top 3 per carrier type and the top 3 overall. Feel free to download this infographic as a PDF file.

When it comes to global leaders in the PSS space, Amadeus Altéa is at the top of the list. It ranked as the number 1 PSS in Europe and Africa, and number 2 in Asia-Pacific and the Middle East.

SabreSonic wins the silver medal. It was the top PSS in North America and Latin America, with a strong presence in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Even though it’s only used in one region, TravelSky came in third place overall. It’s used exclusively by airlines in China, with some other Asian airlines also making use of the PSS.

To find out more about fleets, PSS providers and other tech used by major airlines around the world, check out the Yieldr Airline Hub.