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Expedia CEO: Google Is Our Biggest Competitor

Dennis Schaal photo
Dennis Schaal
Mark Okerstrom Expedia Group CEO and president

Photo Credit: Expedia CEO Mark Okerstrom sees Google as the company's most important threat. He's pictured speaking at an Expedia partner conference in Las Vegas December 5. Expedia Group / Adam Shane Productions

Skift Take

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.

Who is Expedia Group's most important competitor? It must be Booking Holdings, right? No, said Expedia Group CEO Mark Okerstrom, it's Google. Answering questions in a media briefing Thursday at the company's Explore '18 conference in Las Vegas, Okerstrom said, "The internet has been littered with the bodies of companies put out of business by Google.” Okerstrom said Google's key advantage is the prominence of its search engine, and the grip it has on consumers with people turning to Google for answers to myriad things. As for Booking, Okerstrom said he's not as worried. Expedia Group has many things that Booking Holdings doesn't, he said, citing

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