Top Stories
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The real-world challenges for travel startups, as mirrored in Hipmunk’s story
DigitalHipmunk co-founder and CEO Adam Goldstein, 25, believes his flight and hotel metasearch company can one day be larger than Kayak, and with $20.2 million in funding and revenue that has trickled in from the moment Hipmunk debuted, he thinks he has the time to prove it. “We think we can be bigger,” Goldstein says, [...]
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Priceline completes acquisition of Kayak
DigitalPriceline completed its $1.8 billion acquisition of Kayak today, meaning Kayak ceases trading as a public company, and becomes a Priceline subsidiary. Game on. Priceline says it paid $522.4 million in cash and issued more than 1.5 million shares of common stock to pay for the right to meld the travel metasearch company into the Priceline [...]
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Five startups that want to define the future of travel in five different ways
DigitalBetween business and leisure travel, transportation that ranges from planes to bikes, and booking platforms for everything from hotels to tours, there are endless opportunities to define the future of travel. This week’s SkiftSeedlings speaks to that breadth of opportunity by including everything from a media company looking to launch the world’s largest consumer travel [...]
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TripIt reveals preferred seat tracker details for TripIt Pro subscribers
TransportTripIt made good on its pledge and released a Seat Tracker feature in its premium TripIt Pro product. Subscribers to the $49 per year TripIt Pro service can share their itineraries, identify their seat preferences (window or aisle, front or back of cabin, exit row or bulkhead), and then Seat Tracker alerts travelers when a [...]
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TripAdvisor CEO bullish now but takes blame for slow move to Kayak-style search
DigitalTripAdvisor users long-complained about the pop-up windows that appeared when they searched for a hotel on its sites, but CEO Steve Kaufer long-resisted transitioning to the more-appealing Kayak-style hotel metasearch. Speaking to financial analysts the other day at the J.P. Morgan Global Technology, Media and Telecom Conference in Boston, Kaufer said he now “takes the lump” [...]
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Expedia: AirAsia joint venture falls short but brand-building continues
TransportExpedia CEO Dara Khosrowshahi concedes its AirAsia-Expedia joint venture is “not where we want it to be yet,” but he’s confident the new leadership, which combines AirAsia’s marketing know-how and local expertise and Expedia’s technology and product expertise, will propel it forward. “We have a strong service in Japan that’s driving the rest of the [...]
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TUI’s new CEO plans operations overhaul with $1.3 billion profit goal
DigitalTUI AG said it plans to generate 1 billion euros ($1.3 billion) in operating profit by 2015 and resume its dividend as new Chief Executive Officer Friedrich Joussen overhauls Europe’s largest tour operator. Joussen, who took over from Michael Frenzel in February, will cut administrative costs and jobs at the corporate headquarter in Hanover, Germany, [...]
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Google and ITA Software abandon airline reservations business
TransportEight years after signing a deal to power Air Canada’s reservations system and two years after Google acquired ITA Software, the company is withdrawing from the airline reservations business. ITA Software’s website states: “We’re discontinuing the Passenger Services System (PSS) for airlines. We’re doing this to enable our team to focus on other travel solutions [...]
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Kayak first quarter profit plummets in last hurrah as independent company
DigitalKayak’s first quarter profit fell more than 48%, compared with a year earlier, as the travel metasearch company increased its stocked-based compensation, and spending on brand and online marketing. Kayak filed its results with the Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday, and it could be the final time such detail is publicized as Priceline’s $1.8 billion [...]
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The travel industry maverick fighting to change how we buy airline tickets
TransportFarelogix CEO Jim Davidson learned persistence and salesmanship from the imperfect contents of a blue suitcase that he lugged door-to-door in his Elmira, New York, neighborhood at age 8 with his dog, Lucky, at his side. It was the 1960s and Davidson’s father, a pressman at Artistic Greeting Cards, would bring home birthday-card rejects that [...]
