Ctrip.com International Ltd of China, an online travel service provider, signed an agreement to buy Skyscanner Holdings Ltd, a travel search website, which is valued at about $1.74 billion.
According to Reuters, Skyscanner was valued at $1.6 billion when it acquired $159 million from a group of investors in a funding. The company was then reported to be considering a public offering.
CTrip took the sale by acquiring the company in their signed agreement.
"Skyscanner is one of the largest travel search platforms in the world," James Jianzhang Liang, co-founder and Executive Chairman of Ctrip stated according to their website.
"We are excited to welcome Skyscanner into the Ctrip group. Ctrip and Skyscanner share the same passion and dedication in providing travelers around the world with better services. This acquisition will strengthen long-term growth drivers for both companies."
Both companies aim to complement each other's expertise to aid the consumers for easy traveling. CTrip will benefit from Skyscanner's international positioning, where it bragged of millions of users from around the globe.
Skyscanner, on the other hand, will make use of CTrip's first hand technology and experience from being the leading travel service provider of China.
"Ctrip is the clear market leader in China and a company we can learn a huge amount from. Today's news takes Skyscanner one step closer to our goal of making travel search as simple as possible for travelers around the world," said Gareth Williams, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Skyscanner.
Williams reiterated that both companies share a common view to provide and aid travelers an organized and hassle-free traveling. In doing this, they need to have powerful technology and a 'traveler-first approach' in handling their service.
"In taking the next step to achieving our goal, Skyscanner will remain operationally independent and our growing global team will continue to innovate and deliver the products travelers know and love. It's an exciting time for our business, our partners and the travelers who use us," Williams added.
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
