Dennis Schaal, Skift
Expedia is an opportunistic company, and mergers and acquisitions are part of its DNA. The company has been quiet on this front for the past three years. It is sort of due to make another big splash.
4 days ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Expedia Group is arguably — OK, clearly — not "The World's Travel Platform." But we understand that marketing machines strive to do their thing.
3 weeks ago
Steven Schwankert, Skift
Ctrip has been able to spend most of its 15-year history riding a rising travel tide in China while buying out much of the competition to blunt their challenges. For 2019, Ctrip will have to stand up and get moving to recapture momentum and investor attention.
2 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Booking.com has been making strides in the U.S. market for several years, but the challenges are formidable. Expedia is outspending Booking.com on U.S. TV, and then there is Airbnb to throw into the equation.
2 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Expedia has dealt with a ton of distractions in recent years as it acquired Wotif, Travelocity, Orbitz Worldwide, and HomeAway, for example. CEO Mark Okerstrom wants to focus on the basics instead, and doesn't want to take bold steps into dining reservations or food delivery for now. On the other hand, Expedia is a very acquisitive company so never say never.
2 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
It's rare to have an Expedia CEO speak so candidly about Google's threat to his own company. After all, Google knows how to punish companies when it wants to. Given Barry Diller's recent statements, and Okerstrom's view, there must be a lot of concern in Expedialand behind the scenes.
2 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
Booking.com is taking its sweet time to implement a flights-to-attractions travel offering. Some would say the pace is Google-like in its slowness. But behind the scenes, data reigns supreme, and dictates whether a product is scrapped, implemented with a twist, or then reshaped anew. Refill the popcorn. This will take a while.
3 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
It's back to the future for Booking Holdings, which is pivoting to emphasize the prepaid hotel model that its Booking.com unit basically spurned for most of its history. This means better cash flow because consumers pay when they book, and higher commissions.
3 months ago
Dennis Schaal, Skift
It's becoming increasingly clear that online travel players will try to leverage the heck out of connections between food delivery, ridehailing, and booking hotels. Uber and Lyft will undoubtedly become a bigger part of the action, as well.
4 months ago
Sean O'Neill, Skift
Shares in the hotel search company rose the most in two years on news that a cut in ad spending had pushed the Expedia-controlled company into the black. But the company, which once enjoyed meteoric growth, seems unlikely to return to turbo-charged revenue gains anytime soon.
4 months ago
Sean O'Neill, Skift
Diller is one of the godfathers of online travel and Expedia is probably among the top two travel advertisers in Google. Whether his comments will lead to lobbying or business practice changes, is today's multibillion dollar question.
4 months ago
Andrew Sheivachman, Skift
The Booking Holdings CEO is taking the long view, which can be difficult for the leader of a public company to accomplish while growing stock value. The opportunity is there, though, for the online booking leader to improve its offerings with data-based personalization.
5 months ago