FlightGlobal, Diio and FlightStats create powerhouse in air travel data analytics

FlightGlobal, an aviation information group, today announces the acquisition of two pioneering US businesses that will help create a powerhouse in data analytics for the global air travel sector. Diio LLC, a leading provider of airline market intelligence tools, and FlightStats Inc., a pioneer in flight data services, will now sit alongside FlightGlobal’s existing portfolio of fleet, aircraft finance and schedules data services.

With these latest transactions, FlightGlobal emerges with a world-class air travel data and analytics capability, building on the acquisition of the Innovata airline schedules business in 2014. Diio and FlightStats already work closely with FlightGlobal as long-standing commercial partners and significant users of the group’s schedules data.

Diio LLC, headquartered near Washington DC, provides a portfolio of online intelligence tools for the global air transport and travel industry, both under its own brand and those of its partners. The company’s flagship Diio Mi service brings together schedules, fares and traffic data into a single online market intelligence toolset, used extensively by airlines and airports principally in North America. In cooperation with the International Air Transport Association (IATA) and Airlines Reporting Corporation (ARC), Diio powers such products as IATA PaxIS, ARC DataXpert Market Intelligence and IATA/ARC Direct Data Solutions (DDS). Diio also hosts the SRS Analyser schedules analysis tool, developed for international markets in cooperation with FlightGlobal and IATA.

FlightStats Inc., based in Portland, Oregon, is a pioneer in making real-time global flight data available to power services and decision-support tools for many of the world’s leading airlines, travel agencies, mobile app developers and online services. Its cutting-edge technology combines vast volumes of data from over 400 sources, including live aircraft tracking, to build an evolving picture of the status of flight arrivals and departures across the airline system. The company is already actively working with FlightGlobal on ways to help clients improve workflow processes around flight disruptions and to gain insights into the cause of delays.

Christopher Flook, who heads the FlightGlobal business as RBI Managing Director, says: “With the talent, technology and resources we have now assembled, FlightGlobal is well-placed to help the air travel sector take the next significant step forward in managing, integrating and analysing its data. We already worked well together as standalone businesses, but coming together as a single group now allows us greater ability to combine our data and experience to deliver huge value for our customers.”

David Hoppin, Diio CEO, says: “Diio was founded fifteen years ago with the vision that we could combine fast database technology and expert user-interface design to make it easy for airline decision-makers to assemble facts in time to inform the decision at hand. The company’s uninterrupted growth since 2001 confirmed the vision. Now, as part of the FlightGlobal family, we can leverage best-in-class data assets and the resources of a much larger organisation to go after exciting growth opportunities in all parts of the world.”

FlightStats founders, Chairman Jeff Kennedy and CEO Tod Hutchinson, said: “As a standalone company we’ve invested heavily in a modern data management platform that enables us to acquire, process and deliver data at huge scale and speed. With the additional resources that the FlightGlobal group now brings, we’re excited about the ability to move faster still and to combine data in new and innovative ways to solve high value problems for the industry. Together we’re well-positioned to be a critical hub in the travel ecosystem.”

FlightGlobal, headquartered in London, is the aviation arm of Reed Business Information, which itself sits within the Risk & Business Analytics business area of RELX Group.