Travelocity bought by Expedia for $280 million in cash

One might go onto many websites to find the cheapest hotel. Someone might go onto Travelocity, while another person goes onto Expedia. Now, they are the same company.

A deal has been approved for Expedia to buy Travelocity from Sabre Corporation. Sabre Corporation will receive $280 million in cash.

Expedia adds this deal to their list of companies. Expedia already owns Hotels.com, Hotwire, and Egencia. Egemcia is the world’s fifth largest travel management company, while Hotels.com and Hotwire helps a person book a hotel, flight (Hotwire only), or car rental (Hotwire only).

With the deal, Sabre Corporation can now put more of its focus on the sale of flight tickets, hotel rooms, and car rentals on its back-end system. It can also just focus on the competition with their system: Travelport and Amadeus, who, like Sabre Corporation, also sells items for travel agencies.

Travelocity and Expedia had worked out a deal in 2013 that allowed customers on each website to access the other one. (People on Expedia could go onto Travelocity from the website, and vice versa).

With the transaction, Expedia’s stock shares rose 1.9%, or $1.62. Their stock share now stands at $87.44.

Expedia’s other main competitors are Orbitz Worldwide Inc. and Priceline Group. Orbitz, whose stock is at $9.97, offers hotels, flights, cruises and car rentals. Stocks had gone north of $10 following rumors that the company was selling, but died off. Meanwhile, Priceline Group owns Priceline, Booking.com, Kayak, and OpenTable. The group also sells hotels, flights, car rentals, and vacation packages. Their stock fell almost $12 on Friday after the sale, bringing each share to $1037.99.