The purchase includes all proprietary technology and content, and the trade of some of the UK’s leading e-travel businesses, including:
-Bargainholidays.com – an online retailer of charter based package holidays
-A2Btravel.com – a scheduled flight information and travel site
-1Ski.com and Boardit.com – specialist winter sport sites
-and Ferrybrooker.com – a proprietary online ferry booking service
In the financial year ending 31 March 2001, EDT generated gross sales of £14.2m with gross profits of £2.5m.
EDT specialist sites, particularly the charter based package holiday content, will complement the OTC market proposition to the fifty plus travel sites currently operated by OTC. EDT sites will continue to operate as separate brands, and these sites will be enhanced by OTC technology, product and supporting infrastructure. All sites are expected to benefit from the cross-sale of these complementary products.
The acquisition will create one of the largest e-travel groups in the UK, with some two million unique users and over 300,000 transacting customers.
Commenting on the acquisition, OTC chief executive Mark Jones said: This acquisition is an excellent fit for OTC. Our focus to date has been on scheduled flight based bespoke travel, so the acquisition of the leading online charter based package holiday business and specialist ski and ferry sites will strengthen our overall market proposition in terms of content, travel products and technology. We expect to benefit from the cross-sale of these complementary products and yield more large customers in the telecom, retail, media and financial services sectors
Emap’s decision to sell its online travel activities reflects the Group’s increasing focus, the requirement for online assets to complement its offline products and the clear financial returns required from digital activities.
Emap Digital’s chief executive Paul Keenan said: We have previously stated that we are focusing our online activities towards our strategically important off-line assets. We don’t have a major presence in the travel magazine market and believe that these online assets will be more readily developed within a specialist online travel company. Given the market position of OTC, we believe it will be an excellent home for these on line assets.
The consideration values the assets acquired by OTC (including goodwill) at £2.8m and is payable via a vendor placing of 9,200,000 new ordinary shares in OTC of £0.25 per share plus £0.5m in loan notes payable in November 2002. In addition, a further 800,000 new ordinary shares at £0.25 per share are to be allotted pursuant to a cash placing. Application will be made for the new ordinary shares to be admitted to the Alternative Investment Market of the London Stock Exchange and dealings are expected to commence on Tuesday 19 June 2001.