- Amex GBT launched AI travel booking.
- It enables air and hotel reservations.
- 90 percent of users satisfied with travel tech.
AMERICAN EXPRESS GLOBAL Business Travel launched the Egencia AI connector in Anthropic’s Claude. The integration allows travelers and enterprise AI agents to search, book and manage policy-compliant air and hotel travel within the platform.
It also introduced its agent-to-agent architecture and expanded Egencia AI’s conversational capabilities to Google Chat and Microsoft Teams, AMEX GBT said in a statement.
“The conversation in our industry is shifting from connecting systems to connecting intelligence – from APIs to AI agents that can reason, act and transact with trust,” said Evan Konwiser, Amex GBT chief product and strategy officer. “With our Egencia AI connector in Claude, employees and enterprise AI agents can search, book and manage air and hotel travel within policy through their existing Claude enterprise environment.”
The Claude connector allows users to search and book air and hotel travel through Egencia AI without leaving the platform. It applies company travel policies during the booking process, the statement said. The connector will be available to Egencia customers in the third quarter of 2026.
Agent-to-agent architecture
The integration is powered by Amex GBT’s A2A architecture, which connects travel management services with enterprise AI environments. It interprets traveler requests, breaks them into tasks and routes them to AI agents that handle flight searches, hotel bookings and trip management.
The system operates within corporate travel policies, traveler profiles and negotiated supplier agreements while feeding transaction data into enterprise reporting systems, the company said.
Amex GBT said the architecture enables enterprise AI agents to access travel data while maintaining policy controls. The company is expanding AI capabilities across its travel technology portfolio.
Egencia AI’s conversational capabilities will expand to Google Chat in August 2026 for early adopters, with wider availability expected by year-end.
The company also launched a pilot of a conversational travel assistant for Neo customers in Microsoft Teams, expanding access to travel services through enterprise collaboration platforms.
AI adoption and integration
Alongside the announcements, Amex GBT released Building Trust at the Breakpoints: How AI is Transforming Business Travel, a Forrester study of more than 500 enterprise IT decision-makers and 2,000 business travelers.
The report found that 90 percent of decision-makers were satisfied with their travel technology, but only 3 percent said it was fully integrated into enterprise workflows.
It also found that 92 percent of decision-makers believe AI will transform business travel, while 78 percent cited governance and auditability as barriers to adopting autonomous AI.
Amex GBT is integrating machine learning, large language models, natural language chat and AI-driven insights into Complete by SAP Concur and its platforms as it expands its travel technology portfolio.
The announcements come as Amex GBT moves towards acquisition by Long Lake Management under a definitive all-cash agreement valued at about $6.3 billion.
Major shareholders, including American Express, Expedia, Qatar Investment Authority and BlackRock, support the acquisition. Together, they hold 69 percent of Amex GBT’s shares and have entered voting agreements in favor of the deal.
The American Express brand licensing agreement will remain in place after the transaction, ensuring continuity for clients and partners.
Separately, Amex GBT and Chooose will launch a hotel emissions tracker in the third quarter to calculate users’ Hotel Carbon Measurement Initiative reporting requirements.
