Online Travel News

Scores of Americans already use Rakuten.com for cashback without knowing it belongs to one of Japan's largest tech companies. Rakuten Travel wants to turn those shoppers into hotel guests.

Expedia spent years consolidating a sprawling portfolio of consumer brands into a unified platform, and is now becoming a B2B infrastructure company that happens to run consumer brands.

Expedia CEO Ariane Gorin, who ran its B2B unit before becoming CEO two years ago, is giving Parades the freedom and resources to expand the business. Expedia now faces the complexity of integrating two new businesses: Tiqets and CarTrawler.

Leaving financial distress behind matters, but Capital A is no longer selling an airline turnaround story, it’s pitching a diversified travel-tech future. Its bigger test is convincing global investors it is more than the airline business it left behind.

There's an AI backlash coming, for sure.

Roamie became a victim of test-and learn. Expedia found that a chatbot that's an end-to end solution isn't practical for now — but it might be in the future.

Expedia isn't reinventing the OTA. It's stretching the definition — upstream into inspiration, downstream into day-of-travel — so booking becomes one stop in a longer relationship.

MakeMyTrip wants to list in India but can't say when. The regulatory groundwork has started, the timeline hasn't. Watch this space... slowly.

Expedia's outgoing chief financial officer said during its most recent earnings call that investments in its B2B unit could pressure margins near term. First Tiqets, and now CarTrawler, could be the investments he had in mind.

Both Airbnb and Uber have massive audiences. At first glance, expanding their travel offerings looks like an opportunity there for the taking. They will both need to prove it.