Sabre Posts Second Quarter Loss - Lays Off 900 Employees

Fort Worth’s Star-Telegram is reporting that Southlake, Texas-based Sabre Corporation is laying off nearly 10 per cent of its workforce. One third of those impacted are at Sabre’s headquarters in Southlake.

Sabre, a software provider for airlines, hotels, OTAs and travel agencies, announced the layoffs as part of a “Cost Reduction and Business Alignment” initiative while reporting a $6.5 million US loss in the second quarter of 2017.

TravelPulse Canada reached out to Sabre to see how the layoffs impacted their Canadian business, but a Sabre spokesperson referred to an official statement, saying “it is all we are prepared to share at the moment.” TravelPulse has since learned that one Sabre employee in Canada was impacted by the layoffs.

“From time to time we adjust staffing to meet business requirements and opportunities, just like any well-managed company must do,” the statement read. “We will continue to hire and grow with a focus on skill sets and needs that reflect business priorities.” The statement went on to say that the job reductions include some open positions that won’t be filled.

While the cuts will be felt across all business units, it appears that Airline Solutions, which has had a rough time of late with the loss of Southwest Airlines’ hosting business and the company posting an $80M-$100M US charge associated with the discontinuation of its Air Berlin contract, may be hit hardest.  During the Q&A session of Sabre’s second-quarter earnings call, Sabre CEO Sean Menke stated “Airline Solutions is the one where we probably spent the most amount of time.”.

The layoffs and other cost reduction initiatives are expected to save the company $110 million US in 2018.

Sabre released the following results Monday:

- Net loss of $6.5 million US, vs. a net income of $72.0 million US for the same period last year

- Second quarter revenue increased 6.6 per cent

- Airline and Hospitality Solutions revenue grew 7.8 per cent

- Travel Network revenue rose 6.3 per cent, with bookings growth of 2.4 per cent

- Adjusted EBITDA decreased 3.7 per cent to $261.4 million US and Adjusted EPS declined 5.4 per cent to $0.35 US

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