Executive sees improvement in remainder of 2025
Sabre executives noted “the weakness of corporate bookings” and the pullback of government and military travel as causes of a second-quarter decline of air distribution bookings. Kurt Ekert, CEO, speaking on an earnings call, said that there was a “challenging” operating environment, but that the company expects to see improvement in the second half of 2025.
Air bookings fell 1% year over year in the second quarter, below the low-single-digit growth Sabre had projected in its previous earnings call, Ekert said. Lodging, ground and sea bookings were flat year over year, leading to a 1% decline in total bookings for the quarter.
Ekert said, “While we expected some industry stabilization during the quarter, incremental industry weakness emerged in June and continued into July, which was the driver of our air distribution shortfall to expectations.”
Some countries — including Mexico, Australia and South Korea — had a “disproportionate decline,” according to Ekert, while other countries in which Sabre has a smaller share of business — the UK, Greece and Norway, for example — had stronger quarters.
The decline is not “structural” and should stabilize over time, said Ekert, adding, “We anticipate the lower mix of corporate bookings versus leisure to continue through the remainder of 2025.”
Sabre now expects air distribution bookings to grow in the range of 4%-10% year over year in the second half of the year. In its previous earnings call, the company had projected double-digit bookings growth for the full year.
Part of the lower expectations come from the same factors in the second quarter, said Ekert, who also noted the launch of a planned multi-source low-cost carrier content solution has been pushed back to early 2026 from the second half of 2025 due to “a temporary delay from technology and connectivity development.” That solution had been expected to add five percentage points of air distribution in the second half of the year.
The company reported 38 live NDC connections operating, and Ekert said NDC as a percentage of total air distribution remains in the low single digits.
Sabre reported $687.1 million in revenue for the second quarter, down 1% year over year. Distribution revenue was down 1%, and IT solutions revenue declined 2% year over year. The company had a net loss of $256.3 million in the quarter, compared with a $69.8 million net loss in the second quarter of 2024.
