Image via Google.

After a long legal challenge, American Airlines won a battle with Orbitz when a judge from Illinois lifted a restraining order that prevented American from pulling its flights from the Orbitz websites. The win allowed American Airlines to cancel a contract with Orbitz. American Airlines has earned nearly 5% of Orbitz’s worldwide revenue for the first nine months of this year—a huge blow to Orbitz.

“It is unfortunate that as of Dec. 21, American Airline flights will no longer be available on our Orbitz.com and Orbitz for Business sites,” said Brian Hoyt, spokesman for Orbitz. In the near term, we believe that most of this ticket volume will be replaced by other airline suppliers… [Orbitz] has access to more than 400 airlines globally and sells tens of millions of air tickets each year.”

The fight isn’t over for Orbitz who says that that the company “will continue to seek an arrangement” with American.

American feels that travelers should directly deal with their website, in order to save passengers money and ultimately have a more tailored experience. While Orbitz feels that without intermediaries, consumers couldn’t effectively compare prices.

“American Airlines regrets any inconvenience this may cause our customers,” said American Airlines vice president for sales Derek DeCross. “While we could not reach an agreement with Orbitz, we are committed to letting customers know of the multitude of options they have to purchase travel on American Airlines… In today’s competitive marketplace, it is important for American to be free to customise its product offerings to improve the customer experience as well as distribute its products in a way that does not result in unnecessary costs.”

American’s win is worrying to third-party travel sites, as other airlines may follow American’s lead. “…if American’s model proves to be successful, we might see other airlines using similar distribution systems and methods down the road,” said Anne Banas, executive editor at SmarterTravel.com.

Though some argue that the two companies, American and Orbtiz need each other, “The goal of American was not to terminate Orbtiz; the goal was to get Orbitz to change the way it accessed its fares,” said Joe Brancatelli of Joesentme.
[CNN]