Role Summary
The Manager – Distribution owns the airline's global distribution strategy across direct and indirect channels. The role is responsible for driving NDC adoption, ensuring accurate and consistent content across all distribution touchpoints, optimizing distribution cost and performance, and mitigating fraud and GDS misuse. You will work closely with internal stakeholders and external partners to deliver efficient, differentiated, and secure distribution outcomes.
Key Responsibilities
Distribution Strategy & Channels
- Define and execute global distribution strategy across Direct, NDC, GDS, OTA, Metasearch, Corporate/TMC, and Agency channels.
- Onboard and scale key partners (aggregators, resellers, tech providers) to optimize reach, mix, and performance.
- Improve utilization and effectiveness of existing channels; design and launch new distribution models.
Content Governance & Quality
- Own end‑to‑end content governance including fares, ancillaries, bundles, branded fares, and rich content across channels.
- Ensure content accuracy, timeliness, and consistency through monitoring, automation, and exception management.
NDC & API‑Based Distribution
- Lead NDC roadmap, partner migration, certifications, and API capabilities (shopping, pricing, servicing, disruption handling).
- Drive continuous enhancement of NDC features, partner integrations, and developer experience.
Cost, Performance & Risk Management
- Manage distribution economics including GDS fees, aggregator costs, payment fees, fraud losses, and chargebacks.
- Define KPIs and dashboards covering conversion, yield, attach rates, servicing costs, latency, and partner performance.
- Implement controls for fraud, GDS misuse, speculative bookings, and policy abuse.
Governance, Compliance & Analytics
- Ensure compliance with IATA NDC/ONE Order, ATPCO, BSP/ARC, and evolving industry standards.
- Govern partner SLAs and technical reliability.
- Deliver actionable insights from distribution data to senior stakeholders and drive commercial decisions.
Qualifications:
- 10+ years of experience in airline, GDS, aggregator, OTA, or TMC distribution with progressive responsibility
- Strong expertise in API‑based distribution and IATA NDC, including Offer/Order APIs, schemas, conformance, and servicing workflows
- Hands‑on experience with GDS (Edifact), ticketing and servicing flows, and ADM/ACM commercial mechanisms
- Solid knowledge of ATPCO fare filing, branded fares, ancillaries, and rich content distribution
- Strong understanding of payments and fraud including PSPs, tokenization, 3DS, risk scoring, and chargeback management
- Proficiency in data analytics using SQL and BI tools to build dashboards and drive KPI‑based decisions
- Proven experience managing distribution costs, partner SLAs, and commercial agreements
- Excellent stakeholder management, vendor governance, and cross‑functional leadership skills
