Travelport has completed the acquisition of Singapore-based Sprice Pte. Ltd., which owns and operates hotel and travel search engine Sprice.com. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. As a consequence of the deal, Travelport will significantly expand its hospitality offering by providing Galileo and Worldspan-connected agents with access to Sprice.com portfolio of over 240,000 international hotel properties, as well as a comprehensive suite of hotel reviews, merchandising options and comparison tools. Travelport will also utilise Sprice's proven search technology to enhance its GDS channels, enabling the company to deliver and distribute more diverse supplier content to its subscriber customers.
As a result of this acquisition, Travelport expects to be able to extend the range of options available to agents, suppliers and their mutual customers. Beyond Travelport's existing channels, Sprice.com current direct to consumer offering provides Travelport with valuable insight into traveller shopping and booking behaviours. Sprice.com is headquartered in Singapore and has an office in Strasbourg, France. Sprice.com will be managed under the recently announced Consumer and New Ventures group within Travelport. Sprice.com was previously backed by two leading venture capital firms, Sofinnova Partners and Walden International. Quilvest Banque Privee, partner at Sofinnova Partners advised the sellers on the transaction.
Gordon Wilson, Deputy CEO, Travelport and President and CEO, Travelport GDS said, “With Sprice.com, Travelport has acquired firstly, a highly innovative proven technology platform that is deeply synergistic to our GDS business, enabling us to deliver and distribute more content and secondly, an established and vibrant inventory of hotel options and comparison tools that will significantly add to our existing hospitality portfolio. Along with these significant assets comes the intellectual capital of the Sprice team, a group of talented executives who we are pleased to have join our company.”
Jerome Thil, Co-founder and CEO, Sprice.com said, “We are excited to be joining Travelport. Bringing together Sprice's Meta search technology and Travelport's powerful GDS transaction processing capabilities creates great synergy and the potential for new development and innovation, charting an exciting new path forward for us.”