Business travel platform Navan has plugged its booking technology directly into Hilton’s central reservation system, in what the company claims is an industry first for managed travel.
The integration, built on APIs developed by Hilton, links Navan’s platform to the hotel group’s Central Reservation System (CRS) and content services. For UK firms that manage travel through Navan, it promises real-time shopping and booking, along with hotel content the two companies describe as “high-quality, source-of-truth”, drawn straight from Hilton rather than routed through intermediary distribution channels.
How the connection works
Two sets of APIs underpin the arrangement. Booking APIs give Navan direct, real-time access to Hilton’s CRS for availability, rates and reservations, while content APIs deliver property and room information directly from the hotel group.
That direct pipeline matters because most corporate hotel bookings still pass through global distribution systems and third-party aggregators, where rates and room descriptions can fall out of step with what the hotel itself is selling. Pulling data from the source should reduce those mismatches, so the room and rate a traveller sees at booking are likelier to match what greets them at check-in.
Dane Molter, SVP, Group Travel Marketplace at Navan, said: “Navan has consistently pushed the boundaries of what’s possible in managed travel. Collaborating with Hilton on this direct connection will allow us to deliver superior experiences for users from their initial hotel search through booking and checkout.”
What it means for UK business travellers
For SMEs without dedicated travel managers, the appeal is accuracy and fewer surprises. Billing disputes and rate discrepancies are a persistent drain on small finance teams, and a booking drawn live from the hotel’s own system removes several points where errors creep in.
According to Hilton’s announcement, the two companies are also working to enable more consistent virtual payment acceptance across Hilton’s global portfolio, building on the group’s earlier move to automate virtual card payments for business travellers.
Frank Passanante, Hilton SVP and Global Head of Sales & HRCC, said: “By partnering closely with Navan and leveraging Hilton’s industry-leading technology and commercial expertise, we are evolving the hotel distribution model and delivering direct connectivity that better supports how corporate customers book, manage, and experience travel.”
Hilton brings considerable supply to the table. The group spans 28 brands, comprising more than 9,200 properties and over 1.3 million rooms across 144 countries and territories, making it one of the largest single blocks of hotel inventory a booking platform can secure direct access to.
For Navan, the deal caps a busy period of product development. The company recently launched a multi-city booking engine for complex itineraries and is folding Reed & Mackay into a unified brand and platform.
Neither side has said whether the model will extend to other hotel groups, but if the Hilton connection delivers the promised accuracy, expect rival chains and travel management companies to face pressure to follow. For UK travel buyers long frustrated by the gap between what they book and what they get, that competition would be no bad thing.
