American Airlines chooses IBM as cloud provider

An image of the underside of an airplane as it is flying — (Image credit: Shutterstock)

American Airlines has selected IBM to be its cloud provider, porting a variety of its applications to IBM Cloud and planning to develop new applications using IBM Bluemix.

The company will also have access to IBM's advanced analytics capabilities and technologies, helping transform it into a forward-thinking innovative organisation.

The move will also enable AA to offer customers a more immersive experience when they use any of the airline's services, including searching for and booking flights and using its pre-flight services.

As part of the tendering process, American Airlines invited IBM to build a selection of pilot applications to test how fast they could be deployed to IBM Cloud. The tech giant will now analyse all of AA's processes to see which can be easily moved to the cloud and which would need to be re-built, although the airline said it doesn't expect to move everything to the cloud either now or in future.

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“With the incredible proliferation of and access to data, cloud is becoming a platform for innovation. The scalability and performance of the IBM Cloud, combined with Bluemix, turns the cloud into an enabler of innovation and a way to create new services and business models.” said Robert LeBlanc, senior vice president of IBM Cloud.

“This partnership is about delivering the flexibility to American Airline’s business, allowing them to enhance their customer relationships and further gain a competitive advantage.”

American Airlines and IBM's relationship has been close since the 1950s, when the two companies developed the first electronic reservation and ticketing system for early adopters.

Clare is the founder of Blue Cactus Digital, a digital marketing company that helps ethical and sustainability-focused businesses grow their customer base.

Prior to becoming a marketer, Clare was a journalist, working at a range of mobile device-focused outlets including Know Your Mobile before moving into freelance life.

As a freelance writer, she drew on her expertise in mobility to write features and guides for ITPro, as well as regularly writing news stories on a wide range of topics.