Bangalore, Feb. 27: Management Alternatives, Inc. (MAI), the business travel expense management consulting firm "servicing only the buyer", which is headquartered in Norwalk, Connecticut, has announced a tie-up with the Bangalore headquartered ProKonsul from expanding its operations into India.

Carol Ann Salcito, CCTE, President of MAI, said:"As the founding member of MSIG, currently represented in the UK, Germany and Australia, we welcome the opportunity to work with ProKonsul in furthering our service offering to clients. Our North American, European and Asia Pacific headquartered clients are rapidly expanding their travel management programs into the India market and we are proud to be the first independent consultancy to offer local expertise to the worldwide buying community.

"The partnership with MSIG and MAI strongly validates ProKonsul’s unique value in the Indian business travel industry. Despite exponential growth in the past few years, the Indian business travel industry has several unique challenges. The supplier neutral consulting solutions offered by MSIG/ProKonsul collaborates with the corporate travel buyer, enabling them to optimize their Indian business travel program with global objectives," added Gaurav Sundaram, Managing Director, ProKonsul.

ProKonsul is India’s first management consulting firm that offers domain expertise in managed business travel, leisure and event. Leveraging global best practices and business experience, ProKonsul identifies relevant strategies and drives business process improvements, which specifically recognize the challenges of the Indian business travel environment.

ProKonsul is also actively engaged with travel off-shoring/ in-shoring initiatives and shared service center solutions.

Mr. Sundaram brings to this role over 18 years of industry experience in the business travel and hospitality. He was earlier the Chief Executive Officer of Lionel India Limited between 1997-2003. During his stint with Lionel, Gaurav was actively associated with the establishment of a global travel consortium – Global Experts in Travel (GET). Between 2003 – 2005, Gaurav was Director – Asia and represented the region on the Board of Directors of GET.

Earlier, he was the Country Manager, India of Utell International, and has had stints with Thomas Cook India Ltd, Cox and Kings and P and O Travel India Limited.

Denis Campbell, MSIG’s affiliate in the United Kingdom, said, "From the view of widening our scope of operations into the Indian market, Gaurav’s joining the organization could not have come at a more opportune moment. His expertise and unique local knowledge will be very much appreciated."

Bernd H. Fehl, Senior Partner of Trust Management Consultants, MSIG´s German affiliate remarked: "India has become one of the key eastern emerging markets for many German corporations and business travel activities are expected to constantly increase. MSIG´s expansion into India will strongly enhance the organization´s global consulting skills for multinational clients, based on Gaurav´s excellent travel market expertise in India". (ANI)