CellPoint and Southwest Expand Payment Orchestration Partnership

Travel-focused payment orchestration provider CellPoint Digital is expanding its partnership with Southwest Airlines.

The new collaboration will see Southwest use CellPoint’s new cloud-native orchestration platform to provide a personalized travel experience via an “advanced Offer & Order payment solution,” the company said in a Tuesday (March 18) news release.

The platform, the release added, allows for the combination of multiple payment methods, including credit cards, alternative payment methods and the airline’s Rapid Rewards points, within a single transaction.

“Our growing relationship with Southwest Airlines reflects both the strength of our existing partnership and our shared vision for the future of airline commerce,” said Kristian Gjerding, CEO at CellPoint Digital.

“With the launch of our new platform, we’re helping one of our most valued airline partners navigate the crucial transition to modern retailing, enabling them to take greater control of their shopping experience whilst delivering the payment flexibility their customers demand.”

CellPoint introduced its new platform last month, saying it was designed to bolster the airline and travel sector shift to “modern retailing practices” and simplify travel payments.

“The need for simplification has grown as the complexities of the travel ecosystem have exploded,” Gjerding told PYMNTS CEO Karen Webster following the launch.

The traveler is not worried about the mechanics of the payment process, Gjerding added, but with getting what they want for the right price and without friction.

In a travel-transaction, “you’re touching a booking system or reservation system, and then you’re touching a loyalty platform … and then as you go through and pay, then you’re moving to the back-office part of it, where the reconciliation and transfer of funds takes place,” he said.

Gjerding also discussed efforts to turn travel into a bundled, “Amazon-like” experience, which will make payments orchestrators “tier one, mission-critical platforms … so that you’ll be able to split payments into different components” and use buy now, pay later offerings.

As he told Webster: “It’ll take 10 years, but you’ll see the entire travel industry transformed.”

Meanwhile, Southwest and other airlines are lowering their guidance due to economic uncertainty, as reported here last week.

During a presentation at the J.P. Morgan Industrials Conference, Southwest projected that its RASM — a revenue production metric based on available seat miles flown — would grow by 2% to 4% rather than the 5% to 7% it forecast in its prior guidance.

CEO Bob Jordan told conference-goers that the airline lowered its guidance mainly because bookings have weakened in the 2025 macroeconomic environment.