The distribution landscape for air travel in Africa is evolving fast, and a new partnership between AirGateway and Airlink marks an important step forward for travel sellers across Southern Africa and beyond.
AirGateway, a Berlin-based airline distribution technology provider, has announced the full availability of Airlink’s NDC content on its platform. For South African travel agencies and tour operators, this integration completes a key piece of the NDC puzzle unlocking richer airline content, improved servicing capabilities, and greater control over the booking journey.
What’s Changed for Travel Sellers?
Through AirGateway’s BookingPad agent desktop and API, travel sellers now have single-point access to Airlink’s full NDC inventory, including exclusive NDC-only fares and differentiated content that is often unavailable via traditional GDS channels.
This means agents can now:
- Shop and book in real time, using BSP Agency Cash or credit cards
- Manage the full booking lifecycle, including automated rebooking and refunds
- Sell and service ancillaries such as seat selection and additional baggage
- Operate more efficiently, with automated mid- and back-office integrations
Crucially, Airlink content now sits alongside NDC content from more than 35 global airlines, allowing agencies to centralise airline distribution in one place rather than juggling multiple systems and workflows.
Why This Matters for the African Travel Trade
For African travel sellers, NDC is no longer a “future concept” it’s becoming a competitive necessity.
Many agencies across the continent still operate in complex environments marked by fragmented content, manual servicing, and margin pressure. Access to Airlink’s NDC content via a unified platform gives agents:
- More control over pricing and offers, especially on regional routes
- Better servicing tools, which are essential in markets where schedule changes are frequent
- Stronger competitiveness against online-first players, without losing the personal service advantage
As Jorge Díaz, CEO of AirGateway, explains:
“This powerful, future-proof channel is a crucial move for the South African market, offering our partners a unified platform to centralize content, streamline operations, and drive a better travel selling experience.”
The Bigger Opportunity for Tourism in Africa
Airlink plays a vital role in connecting secondary cities, safari destinations, and regional hubs across Southern and Eastern Africa routes that are essential to intra-African tourism growth.
By modernising distribution through NDC:
- Tour operators gain better access to regional air inventory when packaging experiences
- Destination marketing becomes easier, with more dynamic fares and ancillaries
- Inbound and outbound tourism benefits, as global sellers can access African routes more efficiently
Katherine Whelan, Airlink’s Chief Commercial Officer, highlights the strategic importance of this move:
“This partnership enables us to deliver richer, more dynamic content to travel sellers while streamlining the booking experience and improving cost-efficiency.”
For Africa’s tourism sector where connectivity is often the biggest barrier to growth, smarter airline distribution is not just a tech upgrade. It’s an enabler of trade, travel, and transformation.
Bottom Line
The AirGateway–Airlink NDC integration is more than a technical milestone. It signals a shift toward modern, seller-friendly airline distribution in Africa, empowering travel agents with better tools and opening new possibilities for regional tourism growth.
As African travel sellers look to scale, digitise, and compete globally, partnerships like this will play a defining role in shaping the future of the continent’s travel economy.
