2. Surging Mobility Tide
With smart phones nearly ubiquitous,
and sales of tablets surging, mobile
capabilities are considered a “must have”
in the workplace. It’s not just the
consumer market that is booming—
enterprise purchases of smart phones and
tablets are quickly rising too. According
to GigaOM, shipments of tablets to the
enterprise will actually exceed those to
consumers starting in 2015.8
The consumer mobility experience is
shaping employee expectations for
corporate mobile capabilities. Many
employees now expect their corporate
technologies to be as accessible and easy
to use as their personal devices and
applications.
Companies have not yet fully met this
demand: 45 percent of employees think
that the hardware and software devices
they personally use are more useful than
the ones provided at work. 9 Clearly
however, corporate managers realize they
need to respond—more than two-thirds
of companies rank mobility as a high
priority this year, according to a recent
Accenture global survey of CIO’s. 10
3. Budget Crunch
Corporate travel and expense manage-
ment budgets are being squeezed. With
the world’s economies stuck in slow-
growth mode at best, we expect only
modest increases in travel budgets—yet
the cost of travel is expected to swell.
American Express predicts its Global
Business Travel clients will see across-
the-board rate increases in air and hotel
in 20131 (see Figure 4), two travel
categories which make up more than 70
percent of travel and expense costs for
American Express’ large corporate
clients. 11
These pressures are creating a crunch on
travel and expense budgets. Most
companies do not have the option to
significantly reduce business travel as it
helps sustain growth. Travel and expense
management professionals must find
creative ways to fully optimize budgets
to deliver additional value to their
organizations.
Figure 4 | American Express global business travel 2013 forecasted rate increase by region
APAC Economy Short Haul
EMEA Economy Short Haul
NA Economy Short Haul
LATAM Economy Short Haul
APAC Business Class Long Haul
EMEA Business Class Long Haul
NA Business Class Long Haul
LATAM Business Class Long Haul
APAC Mid-Range Property
EMEA Mid-Range Property
NA Mid-Range Property
LATAM Mid-Range Property
APAC Upper-Range Property
EMEA Upper-range Property
NA Upper-Range Property
LATAM Upper-Range Property
-2%
Air
Hotel
Source: American Express advisory services’ Expert Insights global business travel forecast 20131
