Welcome to the Amadeus Q1 2022 presentation webcast. The management of Amadeus will run you through the presentation, which will be followed by a Q&A session. You can ask a question on the phone by dialing zero one on your telephone keypad at any moment during the presentation. I'm now pleased to hand over to you, Mr. Luis Maroto, President and CEO of Amadeus. Please go ahead, sir. Thank you.
Good afternoon, and welcome to our Q1 results presentation, and thank you for joining us today. As always, I'm joined by Till. I will focus on our most important developments in the quarter, and Till will elaborate on the key financial aspects. Let us start with slide four for an overview of our results. In the Q1 of 2022, our performance continued to advance towards pre-COVID levels. As you can see, our quarterly revenue, EBITDA, and adjusted profit reached 65%, 50%, and 28% of 2019 levels respectively. The continued strengthening of our performance was supported by progress in global air traffic and travel volumes. The beginning of the quarter, Omicron slightly slowed us down. However, through February and March, volumes quickly recovered, driving our best quarterly performance in recent times. As you will see, our performance improved across our segments.
On Air Distribution, revenues amounted to 56% of Q1 2019 levels, driven by our bookings evolution, supported by industry recovery and strong market share gains. In Air IT Solutions, our revenue reached 74% of 2019, supported by air traffic evolution. In Hospitality & Other Solutions, our revenue reached 85% of the same year, supported as well by industry recovery and continued customer growth across our broad portfolio of solutions in hospitality. Our revenue progress supported EBITDA generation of almost EUR 300 million in the quarter. Till will elaborate on the details later. Allowing us to deliver free cash flow of EUR 125 million or EUR 143 million, excluding implementation costs paid in the quarter. This is pertaining to our cost saving plan completed last year.
Our free cash flow in the quarter compared to the last quarter of last year had a working capital outflow caused by our volumes seasonality. In the Q1 , we continued to see R&D pick up relative to last year to support new customer implementation projects and to advance in our investment plan. We are focused on investing for the future in several fronts. To name a few, we are evolving our hospitality platform, investing in NDC, into our airline IT digital and merchandising offering, our cloud acceleration, and also our co-innovation partnership with Microsoft. Our leverage has been improving, supported by the strengthening of our cash flow generation, and closed the quarter at 3.4 x last twelve-month EBITDA.
To finish, I will recap on how we are seeing things overall, and please, setting aside the geopolitical and macroeconomic scenarios we have, because we don't know what effect this may have on travel in the coming quarters. We have seen good momentum in the quarter. Travel restrictions have been lifted. We are seeing volume improvement across our businesses and regions. Our best performing region is clearly North America. APAC remains our slowest region, but it will support our gross growth as it continues to recover. In March, we saw a strong recovery in international traffic. Regarding corporate travel, the weight of our bookings through the TMC channel got very close to 2019 levels in March and April. Very positive commentary from the U.S. and European airlines and hotel chains these past weeks on corporate travel growing as well.
From our hospitality business intelligence solution, Demand360, we see hospitality group business in the U.S. in June 2022 exceeding the levels of the same month in 2019. This is an extremely positive indicator of people's confidence to meet again. Everything is moving in the right direction, and it translates into our financial performance becoming more and more robust with growing revenue and stronger EBITDA and free cash flow generation. Please now turn to slide five for an overview of the three reported segments. I will begin with an update on Air Distribution. In the Q1 of the year, we signed 21 new distribution contracts or renewals of agreements with airlines. We also expanded our partnership on the travel agency side with, for example, Travel Advisors Guild, and we became ATPI's primary global technology partner.
As part of our ongoing partnership with Microsoft to innovate in travel, in March, we were pleased to announce Cytric Easy. Cytric, our self-booking tool and expense management tool for corporations, has been embedded in Microsoft 365. Users will be able to plan trips and set travel details without leaving Microsoft Outlook, Calendar or Teams. Meliá Hotels International signed for this functionality in the quarter. In relation to our bookings evolution, bookings in the Q1 were up 36% of 2019 levels, progressing almost six points from the Q4 of last year, with progress happening across regions. Monthly volume performance improved as we advanced in the quarter, and in the month of March, volumes were 33% lower than in 2019. In April, volumes further improved to -29% versus 2019.
Our bookings evolution in the quarter of -44% was supported by industry recovery and strong market share gains. The GDS industry continued to improve quarter-on-quarter, growing -48.4% versus the Q1 of 2019. Region and country mix continues to distort market share evolution. Not without understanding this, Amadeus had a strong market share performance, gaining share globally and in most regions, particularly North America, our best performing region in the quarter. Slide six for Airline IT. We have several new PSS customer wins this quarter. ITA Airways, the Italian flagship carrier, contracted for the full Altéa PSS suite and a broader scope of solutions. Altéa NDC, Amadeus Digital Experience Suite, as well as revenue management, dynamic pricing, merchandising, data management, and passenger servicing solutions. Iraqi Airways also contracted for the full Altéa PSS suite.
Allegiant Air, a US low-cost carrier, contracted for our New Skies PSS. Akasa Air, a new Indian low-cost carrier airline created to tap into the growing long-term prospects for domestic travel in India. To recap on our larger PSS wins announced recently, we estimate that together ITA Airways, Allegiant Air, Hawaiian Airlines, and Etihad will bring Amadeus in aggregate 60 million passengers boarded annually. This is broadly estimated and on a pre-pandemic basis. If we add the undisclosed Altéa customer win in 2020, which on the same basis could bring 40 million PBs, we arrive at an estimated contracted but not implemented 100 million PBs. Again, amounts corresponding to pre-pandemic levels. Turning to our upselling activity in the quarter, Tunisair, Bangkok Airways, Philippine Airlines, and Garuda Indonesia contracted additional solutions and capabilities from our Airline IT portfolio, such as revenue accounting and revenue management.
We also recently announced the acquisition of Kambr, an Amadeus partner, which is a startup specialized in revenue management solution for airlines. In Airport IT, we continued to expand our customer base in the quarter with additions such as Keflavík Airport, Tulsa International Airport, and Ontario International Airport, among others. With regards to our volumes performance in the Q1 , passengers boarded reached 61% of 2019 levels. As you can see, monthly PBs strengthened through the quarter. Into Q2 , April PBs have further advanced, reaching -30% versus 2019. Several regions saw large improvements in performance quarter-over-quarter, most notably North America. This has been our first region to report positive quarterly PB growth versus pre-COVID levels.
Our North America PB positive growth was driven by the recovery in air traffic in the region and also our airline migrations, most importantly, that of Air Canada, which migrated at the end of 2019. Please turn to slide seven for an update on our hospitality segment. In the Q1 , we continued to expand our customer base in hospitality with new customer signings for our business intelligence, sales and event management, and media solutions. The hospitality industry continued to strengthen through the quarter with global hotel occupancy rates in February and March, very close to pre-pandemic levels. Furthermore, looking at occupancies in the coming months, April, May, and June, all are ahead of the same month in 2021 providing continued optimism for increasing traveler confidence.
Hospitality advanced its performance 10 points relative to prior quarter, reaching 85% of 2019 revenues, coming close to full recovery. It has been our best performing segment for some time. It is less exposed to air traffic and has also benefited from a higher weight of non-transaction-based revenues. Hospitality business, which generates the majority of this segment's revenues, showed a steady progress in its performance, supported by strong revenue growth rates across its revenue lines. With this, I will now pass on to Till for further details on our financial performance.
Thank you, Luis. Hello, everyone. Please turn to slide 9 for an overview of our revenue in the period. In the Q1 , our group revenue was 34.8% below 2019, advancing from prior quarter, driven by stronger growth rates across all segments. In Air Distribution, revenue in the quarter was 44.1% below 2019. This revenue performance was primarily driven by the bookings evolution Luis described and by Air Distribution revenue per booking 0.8% lower than in 2019. The lower revenue per booking in 2022 versus 2019 was due to the higher weight of local bookings produced by the higher weight of domestic travel we still have now, and a higher booking cancellation provision versus 2019, which also moves with the bookings inventory and has increased with volume growth.
These negative effects I've mentioned were also partly offset in the quarter by positive effects, including firstly, revenues not linked to bookings evolution performing better than bookings revenue. For example, revenues from solutions provided to travel agencies and to corporations. Secondly, the usual various pricing impacts, which may come from yearly price adjustments, incremental deals, renewals, and others. It is not easy to foresee how all of these parts may move in 2022, but we reasonably expect the dynamics I've mentioned to largely persist over the next few quarters. For the resulting revenue per booking to generally behave along these lines. That is, to range between a bit higher or a bit lower than the revenue per booking we had in 2019. With regard to Air IT Solutions, revenue in the quarter was 25.9% below 2019.
This result was driven by the PB volume evolution, coupled with a 22.5% higher revenue per PB relative to 2019. The higher revenue per PB is caused mainly by a proportion of Air IT revenues that is either not linked to PB or does not flex with PB in the current environment, such as, for example, services or airport IT, which reported much stronger growth rates in the quarter than the PB and the PB linked revenues. Over the coming quarters, as traffic continues to recover, we will likely see the revenue per PB trending downwards towards the pre-COVID levels. There are positive effects as well that will typically support the evolution of revenue per PB, such as upselling, inflation, and other pricing impacts. Regarding hospitality and other solutions, revenue in the Q1 was 15.2% below 2019.
For hospitality, the quarter-on-quarter performance improvement versus 2019 was seen across its revenue lines as described by Luis. Within hospitality, Hospitality IT had stronger CRS and sales and event management revenue growth. Media and distribution was driven by improving hotel and car booking growth rates. Business intelligence also strengthened, driven by new customer implementations. Please now turn to slide 10 for a review of EBITDA, of our EBITDA evolution in the quarter versus the same quarter in 2019, as we've done with volumes and revenue. In the Q1 of 2022, our EBITDA amounted to EUR 296 million, 50.3% lower than in 2019, resulting from, firstly, the revenue evolution explained before.
Secondly, lower cost of revenue than in 2019 by 43.1% linked to the booking volumes evolution. Thirdly, a 7.6% decrease in our combined personnel and other operating expense cost line compared to 2019. To review our fixed cost evolution, we will focus on the change relative to 2021. Please remember, we completed our cost optimization program last year, and thus there are no more associated implementation costs in the P&L in 2022. We continue to remove these from the 2021 P&L for comparison purposes. Our P&L fixed cost in the Q1 of 2022 compared to the same quarter last year were 13.5% higher, in line with our plans and expectations.
This cost evolution resulted from an increase in R&D investment, as Luis mentioned, and in discretionary spend, like travel and training spend, among others, driven by the business expansion relative to prior year. Costs have also been impacted by negative FX effects. Taking together this quarter's P&L fixed costs and CapEx, we had a 13.4% increase over prior year, which we estimate at 10.9% excluding FX, in line with the 10% to 14% fixed cost growth range expectation we have for the year. Please note, this cost growth range is excluding FX, as the US dollar has appreciated considerably versus prior year, and this has had and could continue to have a negative impact on our cost evolution versus 2021 on a reported basis.
This is more than compensated at EBITDA level as FX is also positive on revenues versus 2021. For the Q2 , we are expecting the P&L fixed cost and CapEx growth to step up from Q1, driven by the salary increases which take place in Q2. This is as planned, and we reiterate our cost growth expectation for the year. I would like to add also that in Q2, we will benefit from a one-time positive effect related to a government grant, which will lower our fixed costs and increase our EBITDA and free cash flow by approximately EUR 50 million. Below EBITDA in Q1, 2022 compared to 2021, D&A expense decreased by 3.5%, mainly due to lower depreciation expense linked to a reduction in hardware at our data center in Erding.
Net financial expense increased by EUR 6 million, despite a reduction in interest expense from a lower average gross debt over the period, mostly due to higher exchange losses. The income tax rate in the quarter was 24%, lower than in 2021, impacted by a reduction in income tax rates in France and non-recurring adjustments. Supported by the EBITDA evolution, adjusted profit amounted to EUR 95 million in the Q1 of 2022, and this marks now the third consecutive quarter of positive adjusted profit generation. Please turn to page 11 to review our cash flow evolution. I will start with CapEx. In the Q1 of 2022, our CapEx increased by EUR 40 million or 13% compared to the same quarter in 2021, driven by higher capitalized R&D investment. R&D investment grew by 19.1% in the quarter versus 2021.
CapEx was EUR 30 million lower this quarter than previous quarter, mainly due to the office investments carried out and implementation CapEx from our cost optimization program during the last quarter of 2021. With regards to free cash flow, excluding cost saving program implementation costs paid in the quarter, we generated an amount of EUR 143 million. We will still have some cash outs this year related to our cost optimization program completed last year, but the amounts outstanding going forward are very small. Our free cash flow in Q1 benefited from expanding EBITDA compared to prior quarter and a lower CapEx amount, but it also had a cash outflow from change in working capital. The change in working capital outflow was largely driven by timing differences in collections and payments, versus revenues and costs impacted by the quarterly seasonality in our volumes.
For the next quarter, please note, we also expect a cash outflow from working capital, as we typically have in the Q2 , due to our annual personnel related payments. With this, we've now finished the presentation, and we are ready to take any questions you may have.
Ladies and gentlemen, the Q&A session starts now. If you wish to ask a question, please press zero one on your telephone keypad. Thank you. The first question comes from Adam Wood from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Hi, good afternoon, and thanks for taking the question. Good to see such a strong start to the year. Congratulations on that. I've got two, please. The first one is around market share. I think this is the first time for a little while that you've alluded to market share gains and talked about strong market share gains despite the negative regional mix. If I just compare you to the main competitor back to 2019, it looks on the air side as if there's been about an eight-point market share shift. I mean, I wonder whether you could talk first of all, is that the kind of order of magnitude that you're seeing in the market?
Is there anyone else in the GDS landscape that you'd see taking market share as well as you versus that main competitor? That was the first one. Maybe secondly, just on the cost plan. I wonder if you can give us just a little bit of a feel for the discussions that you have with your customers in terms of the projects they want to do, the demand that's starting to come back. You've obviously been cutting projects due to COVID over the last couple of years. Do you feel that scope of cost plan enables you to meet the demand that's starting to come in from customers and satisfy the R&D demands that are happening?
Is there the potential for you to look at that as we go through the course of this year and accelerate the cost growth because you see stronger revenue growth and stronger potential in future years? Thank you.
Hi, Adam. Thanks for your questions. I mean, with regards to market share, we are not giving specific numbers because, I mean, it's quite subjective, everything related to the mix effects. You can have mix effects today still per country, per region. This is why, I mean, we consider a bit subjective to really provide the specific figures. I mean, you can see the evolution from 2019. I mean, and you have also seen how the GDS is doing compared to how we are doing. What I can tell you is that, yes, we feel we have strong market share gains. Again, it depends how you consider still the region mix compared to 2019.
When we analyze individual regions and individual markets, we are pleased with evolution. That's why we have reported that overall, no matter what, we are having good commercial tractions, but again, with all due respect to what competitors are doing and may do in the future. With regards to the second point, I mean, no, our costs increase, yes, of course, is related to the fact that we see opportunities, but also the fact that we have signed a number of customers, and we have alluded to them in Airline IT. There is a lot of implementations ongoing. It was part of our original plan and original range. We already guided you about how we saw this year. We were considering already some of these opportunities with customers.
Of course, I mean, let's see how things evolve in the coming months. There will be a point where we will see. We keep signing, but clearly there is an opportunity today. I mean, the whole industry is thinking about recovery. I mean, with regards to COVID, I have already alluded to that in my presentation. Things are evolving on a positive way. Of course, we should not be isolated from the economic and geopolitical environment that may impact the recovery.
From the pandemic, we feel that there is optimism in the industry and therefore there are opportunities for us to keep increasing signing customers and therefore invest in the areas that we consider will provide us an opportunity both in terms of getting these customers on board and migrating them into our system or investing in areas that can provide with further opportunities. Definitely the answer is yes, there are opportunities in the market and we will invest according to that. However, as Till explained, we are keeping our guidance that we provided you at the beginning of the year.
Perfect. That's very helpful. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from Kathinka De Kuyper from JP Morgan. Please go ahead.
Thanks for taking my question, and also congratulations on the good start to the year. Two for me. Please. At Q1 you mentioned your performance depends on the global air traffic evolution with IATA back then forecasting -14% versus 2019 in October. It seems that your volumes are a little bit ahead over that. Can you comment on the visibility you have into the remainder of the year? Are bookings coming through further in advance? And then a lot of airlines and airports are struggling with staff shortages and we see flights getting canceled. Is that affecting your business? And then secondly, on the hospitality, can you comment on the pipeline you are seeing for your CRS and PMS solutions? And can you give an update on the Marriott deal, please? Thank you.
Shall I start with the volume question?
Yeah.
Just on this one. IATA actually issued, I think it was at the beginning of March, actually. They issued an updated forecast, where they were referring to passengers boarded or passengers basically origin destination, and they called out a -17% for 2022 in terms of growth expectations. Previously IATA had been talking about RPKs. If you basically translate that back, it's probably approximately minus 30% compared to 2019 from an RPK level. If you now put this into perspective, IATA had already updated their forecast and improved it compared to what has been there last year. Where are we compared to this?
I think we are quite pleased with the volumes where we are. Therefore, you know, what we see in terms of Air IT Solutions, passengers boarded, minus 30% in April, and equally, close to that, minus 29% of bookings in April, is putting us on a good trajectory. Again, we are hopeful. We are seeing very positive signals and signs in the market. Of course there's also some macroeconomic or macro geopolitical uncertainty, and we need to watch that.
Just to clarify, I mean, the latest IATA reference is around -32% compared to the -40%. Again, as we mentioned, okay, you need to consider the Q1 was below this figure. Now we are trending in the -30% more or less in PB. Let's see how things evolve in the future, okay? To see if we can beat this -32%. I mean, things look positive, but I still mention there are some uncertainty about how the current economic environment may impact the recovery. With regards to hospitality, of course, we keep investing in our CRS and PMS. We hope to be able to really get additional customers. We have good opportunities and a good pipeline. Very difficult to really talk more about that.
We have already explained to you that we feel the opportunity is there, and the potential is there. Hopefully, we should be able to really get more customers into our platform. You also ask about Marriott. So far so good. I mean, look, we have a plan. We have been debating in detail with them the scope of the project, and the timing of the project. For the time being, the collaboration between both companies is strong, and the project is moving ahead as planned.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from Sven Merkt from Barclays. Please go ahead.
Great. Good afternoon, and thank you for taking my question. Could you maybe speak a bit more about inflation and how this is impacting the business? Maybe on the pricing side, what proportion of your contracts allow you to increase prices for inflation? And what kind of price increases should we expect in the current environment? Would be also interested to hear if you're holding back any price increases that you could theoretically push through to support your customers and their recovery. And then on the cost side, what kind of wage inflation are you seeing? And are there any measures you can take to kind of mitigate maybe some of the cost pressure there? Thank you.
On the inflation side, inflation impacts our revenue line, and we've got various clauses and that are basically inflation linked. Through those clauses, we can pass on part of the inflation that we see. You would see obviously a positive impact from that. On our cost of revenue, we do not have that. Our main lines are incentives, and they don't have inflationary clauses included. On the P&L fixed cost, we've covered that before. Here we are obviously assessing the situation on a country-by-country basis in order to be competitive from a salary point of view. Again, some markets have got high inflation rates, for example, like India.
Other markets have got lower inflation rate, but you can assume that we are trying to be always competitive, from a salary or from a wage inflation point of view. This is obviously representing the largest part of our cost lines.
Okay. Thank you. That is very clear. Just maybe one follow-up just on the Capital allocation plans. Given that you're now recovering, how do you or will prioritize restocks with dividend versus deleveraging and M&A and maybe other uses of capital?
We obviously are on a good track in terms of profit generation for this year. That's the first point, and that's different to last year, where we obviously had not achieved a positive profit yet. This puts us in a position where of course we can start considering and thinking about the dividend. We would, of course, like to return back to shareholder remuneration respectively value creation in that regard. Of course, it's equally true that we would like to perhaps deleverage further before we immediately come back to a dividend payment. Again, these things are, at the current stage, a little early to say.
Let us first have our objectives achieved for this year, and then we can discuss that question, and we will also inform you accordingly.
Okay, great. Thank you very much.
Thank you. The next question comes from Neil Steer from Redburn. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thanks very much for taking the question. I've just got a couple of quick ones if I may. The first one is I appreciate the figures. Obviously, you're making market share gains, particularly in distribution. Clearly North America and the Expedia wholesale deal is part of that. Could you give us a little bit of color on where outside North America you think you are improving market share? Is there sort of one or two particular regions? Thanks.
I mean, we have already mentioned to you the signature of some of the customers where we can announce, such as ATPI, which is outside of North America. I mean, this is happening in general, well across the board, I would say. We are having good traction, yes. By all means, Expedia is the biggest generation. Even excluding Expedia and not considering mix effects, I mean, as I mentioned, which are always a bit tricky, okay. How do we consider that? We are getting good traction in many parts of the world. I would say it's quite across the board, okay?
You may have in some specific markets, of course, it's not that we are not losing any customer, but overall on other basis, Neil, I mean, as I mentioned, excluding Expedia, we keep market share gains. It's been a positive, overall a positive year.
Okay, thank you. Till, you were very sort of precise, I suppose, with your guidance on what you expect for the average GDS fee this year. You kind of implied the 2019 level plus or minus what you saw in Q1, I think. Plus or minus 1% or thereabout. Could you give us a little bit more precision and guidance on the sort of expected or blended PB fee? Is that possible?
Remember, at the moment, we are still in an environment where our PB fee is elevated due to the higher share of the non-transaction based elements in it. It had started to trend downwards as expected. I still expect that from here, where we are now, that it continues to trend downwards. But look, I mean, seeing it through the quarters, again, we are still above, well above 2019 levels as we are now. We are enjoying that benefit obviously. But again, if you just think of it, that the expectation is that with the volume increase and recovery every quarter, there should be a bit of a step down.
Okay, thanks. Just one final question, if I may. Obviously, before the pandemic, we saw a flurry of airlines move away from the traditional fuller content deals, some wishing to move to the general distribution arrangements and implement surcharging strategies and so forth. As we come out of the pandemic and you re-sign content deals with airlines, does that sort of trend persist, and are we moving gradually away from the fuller content deals, or have we sort of exited that flurry of migration towards the general distribution arrangement? Thank you.
I mean, it's difficult to really give you a complete answer. There may be some airlines still there, but of course it's our role to convince them about look, the capability of our platform and the distribution options and benefits of the indirect channel. I will say in general terms, yes. There will be still some airlines that are keeping that logic as it happened in 2019.
Okay. Thanks very much, and congrats on a great quarter. Thank you.
Thanks, Neil.
Thank you. The next question comes from Michael Briest from UBS. Please go ahead.
Yes, thank you. Good afternoon. A couple from me. Just, Till, on that EUR 50 million sort of one-off government grant, was that embedded in your guidance when you gave it at the start of the year? So is the 10% to 14% increase assuming that that EUR 50 million comes in, or are you gonna treat it as an exceptional item, if you like, and sort of add it back? Then on the inflation side, you mentioned the incentive fees aren't index linked. Presumably, it's true then of the GDS revenue related to that. And can you say on the Air IT side, to what extent indexation is embedded in any of the deals you have there?
Because I'd imagine, particularly with the industry coming out of a crisis, airlines are gonna be quite resistant to any recovery. Just a tiny little add-on. On Asia, it's still very weak. Can you give any sense of, is this caused by the Chinese lockdowns, or how much better things trended in April, perhaps?
On the first question, in terms of the EUR 50 million, that in fact is an exceptional and one-off item, and it was not included in our cost guidance. Technically speaking, if you would now put this into this, the guidance range would obviously be lower. Okay. Again, it's a one-off, and it is a Q2 event, and you will see it as well there disclosed, and we just wanted to mention it to give you advance notice of basically the expectation of our cost and EBITDA for the Q2 . On the second question, in terms of incentive fees or inflation, you have in both also in distribution and in Air IT clauses that allow us to pass on inflation automatically.
We have elements where we are negotiating as well, these clauses. It's true, there are also certain caps and certain ratios involved, but you have in both distribution and Air IT, those inflationary increases coming through.
Yeah. With regards to Asia, I mean, you are right. Asia has been the latest region in terms of recovery, and we have an imbalanced performance there. I mean, as you know, China itself is not impacting us due to the fact that we are not operating in China. Of course, it may have an impact in some international traffic in the rest of the region, okay, an indirect impact there. When we talk about Asia today, I mean, we have seen a strong recovery in some markets.
Let's say, I mean, Australia, New Zealand, India, have recovered strongly and still some way to go for some countries such as Korea or especially Japan, where, as you know, we are a strong player, and still they are having quite high restrictions in terms of travel, especially for international visitors. Hopefully, they will keep coming back and this should improve our worldwide performance. Again, let's see how things evolve in the future. Overall, positive performance in Asia with some countries lagging behind.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from Victor Cheng from Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. A couple, if I may. First one, appreciate, you know, Adam, and you have asked about it already on market share. Can you comment maybe which region that you think has been the weakest potentially and that you have potential to grow more? Then secondly, thinking about revenue per bookings in the medium term when volume and mix normalizes, should we expect the revenue per booking to trend to pre-COVID levels, given dilution from Expedia win and arguably different dynamics in distribution versus pre-COVID? Lastly, given the number of PSS wins that you announced this quarter, has the appetite for IT spend changed in the last year while it recovers?
Okay. Let me come back. Again, I already mentioned about the market share. I mean, look, our goal is to increase our share. I mentioned already that yes, you see in the figures that the strongest performance was in North America, but the potential is everywhere. Of course, the bigger you are in one market, sometimes it's more difficult even though when you have a high market share, I mean, you have some traction and some leverage in the market. But overall, I mean, our goal is not to focus on a specific parts of the world. We'll try to keep growing everywhere. The potential in our view is not specific to one specific market or region.
Of course, in the U.S., we have had increases during years which we are pleased of that. Again, there is no specific focus on one market. Overall, in each single market, we should try to really keep it growing. The second question, do you take it, Till?
I would reiterate on the revenue per booking what I said before in terms of trend. I would expect that we move ourselves kind of to the 2019 levels. Plus then obviously what you saw through the inflation or what you're seeing or what to expect through the inflationary increases in the last two years that happened. Of course, the remainder of it is basically, you know, commercial negotiations, et cetera, et cetera. Without implicitly commenting on Expedia, I would reiterate the expectation in terms of trend of revenue per booking going back to 2019 levels and from there behave similarly to what we've seen before.
I mean, appetite for IT, I mean, look, the answer is yes. Overall, we all feel that, I mean, IT is important for all the industries, including our industry, as we try to optimize and try to really sell better and the relationship with the customers. All the customers are looking for ways to really improve their performance. We are in a good position to provide with the software that is needed and the solutions for them to really address their needs. Of course, when you are in the middle of the crisis, some airlines have reduced because of the need to really adjust that. Hopefully, as the volumes recover and the financial situation of our customers improve, well, they will be keen to really keep investing.
Even though during the pandemic, we have also seen the opportunity of some customers to really take and do some investments in in automating and improving and accelerating their digital capabilities. I would say opportunity is there, and hopefully we will be able to really provide our technology to them.
Got it. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from Fernando Abril-Martorell from Alantra. Please go ahead.
Hello, good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. I have a couple, please. First, with regards to the bookings and PBs evolution in April, I would like to better understand the performance on a region by region. I mean that you've mentioned that APAC is still lagging behind, but Australia, New Zealand and some of the countries are now recovering strongly. I would like to better understand which region is the main driver for the strong trading update. No? Second question is with regards to the host business.
I don't know if you can give us an update with revenue performance in April now, and just as you've mentioned in PB bookings, it would be very helpful compared to 2019. Considering the evolution of this business, I don't know if you think that the host business could reach pre-pandemic revenues by the end of the year.
Let me start with the last one, and then, Till, if you can take the first one. I mean, we are not providing hospitality because, as you know, we are not having any specific KPI as we do with these other two businesses that mainly is giving us the same, you know, information about that, because not everything is linked to one specific KPI we could use. I mean, you have seen the figures in terms of revenue. This is a business that overall has been more resilient. The prospects are positive about the occupancy rates. And also in April, they have been positive and evolving in a positive way. Okay? Similar to what is happening in the rest of the industry.
I have provided you with some information we have on some data that, in terms of summer, is in some areas okay, and mainly you need to consider our high weight in the U.S. in this part of the business. It's looking positive. Look, that's what we see in hospitality, the same we have seen with the rest of the business.
In terms of market shares and regions, just at a high level, we have seen that Asia Pacific actually was leading the step up in April versus March. That was strong, followed by Western Europe, which also has moved further ahead. We had some regions that performed consistently, and that is kind of more or less related to Ramadan seasonality in Middle East Africa. We had a bit of a step back. But overall, if you look at it on a global level, we obviously have seen, again, an improvement month-on-month from March into April.
Okay. Thank you very much.
Thank you. There are no further questions in the conference call. I now give back the word to Mr. Luis Maroto for final remarks.
Thanks a lot for attending the call and for your questions, and looking forward to the Q2 results at the end of July. Thanks a lot.