TRX tried to go public in 2001, pulled the deal when markets turned, and finally listed in 2005. It worked behind the scenes of business travel. TRX processed bookings and transactions for travel agencies and corporate travel managers, and it ran reservation and customer support services. Its data tools showed companies how their employees traveled. By 2005 online booking was spreading, and travel agencies were outsourcing more of their back-office work.

Call Centers and Data

TRX bet that travel agencies and corporations would hand off the routine, high-volume work of processing travel to a specialist. It combined hosted technology with call centers and processing staff. Over time it put more weight on travel data. Its corporate data business showed companies where their travel money went and where they could save. That data also gave them leverage to negotiate with airlines and hotels.

Absorbed by Concur

TRX priced its IPO at $9 a share in September 2005 on the Nasdaq, below the $11 to $13 range it first planned. It spent several years as a small public company while it shifted toward travel data. In 2013 Concur, the travel and expense software maker, acquired TRX. Concur folded TRX's travel data tools into its own corporate travel products. SAP bought Concur the following year.

Cover: At the Railway Station, Alfred Stevens. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for a traveler at the railway station.