It's Been a Busy Year for Travel Acquisitions With Lodging Deals Dominating
Skift Take
Travel acquisitions have been humming along this year and we've seen several deals that will have a lasting impact on consumer behavior. Marriott-Starwood dominated headlines for months although Expedia and Priceline largely have been largely inactive in mergers and acquisitions so far in 2016. We still have a few months left, though.
While Expedia Inc.'s buying spree created most of the mergers and acquisitions buzz last year, 2016 has been a quieter year for mega online travel agency acquisitions and the focus has shifted to hotel and other hospitality tech company acquisitions so far this year.
There have been at least six hotel acquisitions since January totaling more than $16 billion, with the bulk of that amount coming from the Marriott International-Starwood Hotels & Resorts deal that closed last month. Other deals included AccorHotels $2.7 billion buy of Fairmont Raffles Hotels International and SBE Entertainment's $794 million grab of Morgans Hotel Group.
AccorHotels also waded into alternative accommodations when it bought onefinestay for $170 million and also acquired hotel software company John Paul. Two other hotel software exits include Trivago buying Base7booking and TrustYou buying CheckMate (terms of both deals were undisclosed).
Still, there has been plenty of smaller acquisition activity in other sectors and among travel startups in 2016. Some 71 travel companies have been acquired, including both startups and more established players, so far in 2016, according to Mike Coletta, managing director of Travel Startups Incubator.
CB Insights, a New York City-based venture capital and investment data firm, has tracked 17 travel tech deals so far this year. That number includes acquisitions of companies that provide travel booking services, search and planning platforms, on-demand travel, and recommendation sites. Car-hailing services are excluded from CB Insight's analysis, as are any major hotel company acquisitions, for example. Compare that to 13 travel tech acquisitions in 2015 and CB Insights found this year so has seen a record high for venture-backed travel tech acquisitions in terms of the number of exits (see chart below).
The relatively high number of exits of venture-backed companies so far in 2016, though, doesn't necessarily mean it was a windfall for investors. Many of these exits, from WAYN to Hipmunk, for example, were undoubtedly subpar from an investor standpoint.
Travel acquisitions we've identified added up to about $20.1 billion this year in terms of those where the deal prices were disclosed. Last year the total for the entire year was about $6.9 billion. But if you exclude the $13 billion Marriott-Starwood deal, for example, the totals for all of 2015 versus the first half of 2016 would be about the same -- the size advantage
