As CTO for UAL’s e-commerce unit and Mileage Plus programs, Robless is responsible for developing products to satisfy an increasingly savvy traveler. The market is pushing him to look far beyond the in-flight experience. “We don’t consider travel as only being your airline trip. What we view is that your trip is a journey that begins from the moment you step outside the door of your home — getting to the airport, getting on the plane, staying the night wherever you are, being able to move around,” he says. “So what we want to be able to do is offer you more information about that entire itinerary.” That may explain why Robless sees alliances, even with potential competitors, as an important part of his job. Robless is, for example, on the board of directors of the Open Travel Alliance, the airline industry’s advocate for standardizing the use of XML for interbusiness communication. It’s in the airline industry’s interest to collaborate in creating standards for the future, he says. “By establishing a standard way of communicating with the other airlines, it helps our customers and helps provide a broader service to our customers.” In order to establish partnerships effectively, Robless says the first thing a CTO must do is “understand what your company’s interests are. It’s building a bridge with the business people in your company, so that you understand what they want.” That understanding is key to taking the next step: negotiating with outside partners. “As long as you understand what is going to be critical for you, you will be in a better position to make those relationships work,” Robless says, adding that he’s “found that the best way to set up these relationships is to be as open and candid as possible.” Robless has been with UAL for two years, and says the most valuable skill he brought to the job was a background in business communications. “What I’ve found is you can be a great architect and a great engineer, but if you don’t know how to characterize what is new, neat, and whiz-bang about the technology you’re trying to deploy — if you can’t characterize that in terms that of what a marketing or finance person will understand — you’re not going to be able to do it.” So far, Robless says his influence with UAL has expanded. “I don’t know whether it’s a manifestation of the economy or a manifestation of the fact that the responsibilities of our group has grown tremendously,” he says. Initially, he was responsible for United.com, and now his job responsibilities have grown to include Mileage Plus. Anyone in Robless’ position has a “daunting job,” says Henry Harteveldt, a senior analyst at Cambridge, Mass.-based Forrester Research, who follows the travel industry. Harteveldt describes UAL’s site as “certainly very clean, but it lacks key functionality that other competitors have, namely online check-in.” But he has high praise for the EasyUpdate feature that UAL offers Mileage Plus passengers to give them the latest travel information via the Web, a wireless device, or telephone. Robless says “easy update” is one of the latest examples of his foray into wireless technology, and it fits into his mission, which is to keep travel hassle-free for customers. “Providing information that’s as accurate and [as] timely as we can while customers are traveling is one of our biggest missions.” Technology Industry