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Expedia, Inc. (NASDAQ: EXPE) is an U.S. company headquartered in Bellevue, Washington that operates several travel brands including Expedia.com, Hotels.com, Venere.com, Hotwire.com, Egencia (formerly Expedia Corporate Travel), TripAdvisor, Expedia Local Expert, Classic Vacations and eLong. Expedia, Inc.’s companies operate more than 70 branded points of sale in more than 55 countries. Expedia also powers travel bookings for a number of airlines and hotels, consumer brands, high traffic websites, and thousands of active affiliates through Expedia Affiliate Network. It is part of both the S&P 500 and NASDAQ-100 stock market indices.

[edit] History

Founded as a division of Microsoft in October 1995,^[3] Expedia was spun off in 1999, and was later purchased by TicketMaster in 2001^[4] (TicketMaster changed its name to USA Networks in 2001 and then InterActiveCorp in 2003^[5]). IAC spun off its travel group of businesses under the Expedia, Inc. name in August 2005, including Expedia, Expedia Corporate Travel (now Egencia), TripAdvisor, Classic Vacations, eLong, Hotels.com, and Hotwire.com.^[6]

[edit] Officers and directors

• Barry Diller: Chairman of the Board, Senior Executive
• Victor A. Kaufman: Vice Chairman of the Board
• Dara Khosrowshahi: President and CEO, Director
• Michael Adler: Chief Financial Officer, Executive Vice President
• Burke F. Norton: Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Corporate Secretary
• Connie Symes: Executive Vice President, Human Resources
• Pierre V. Samec Ph.D.: Chief Technology Officer
• A. George Battle: Director
• Jonathan L. Dolgen: Director

[edit] Products

[edit] Egencia

Previously known as Expedia Corporate Travel.

[edit] Expedia

[edit] Hotels.com

[edit] Hotwire

[edit] TripAdvisor

[edit] Competitors

• Priceline.com
• Orbitz
• Travelocity

[edit] Mergers and acquisitions

Expedia's first and largest acquisition was Travelscape for US$89.75 million and VacationSpot.com for US$80  million on March 17, 2000. It subsequently acquired Classic Custom Vacations in March 2002 for $78 million. The company has made four divestments, in which parts of the company are sold to another company. On December 31, 2000, Technology Crossover Ventures acquired a 7% minority stake in Expedia for $50 million. USA Networks acquired a 65% majority stake in the company on February 5, 2002, for $1.372 billion, and a year later, on August 8, 2003, USA Interactive acquired Expedia for $3.636 billion. Expedia was ultimately spun off as a separate entity with a value of $7.981 billion. The company made the most acquisitions in 2002, when it acquired three companies: Classic Custom Vacations, Metropolitan Travel, and Newtrade Technologies.^[7]

[edit] Acquisitions

Date	Company	Business	Country	Value (USD)	References
02000-03-17 March 17, 2000	Travelscape	Internet service provider	United States	$&0000000089750000.00000089,750,000	[8]
02001-03-17 March 17, 2001	Vacationspot	Internet service provider	United States	$&0000000070850000.00000070,850,000	[9]
02002-03-11 March 11, 2002	Classic Custom Vacations[note 1]	Travel agency	United States	$&0000000078000000.00000078,000,000	[10]
02002-07-11 July 11, 2002	Metropolitan Travel	Travel agency	United States	—	[11]
02002-10-28 October 28, 2002	Newtrade Technologies	Reservation software	Canada	—	[12]
02004-04-05 April 5, 2004	Activity World	Travel and touring	United States	—	[13]
02004-04-12 April 12, 2004	Egencia	Travel agency	France	—	[14]

[edit] Divestitures

Date	Acquirer	Target company	Target business	Acquirer country	Value (USD)	References
02000-12-31 December 31, 2000	Technology Crossover Ventures	Expedia, Inc.[note 2]	Online travel	United States	$&0000000050000000.00000050,000,000	[15]
02002-02-05 February 5, 2002	USA Networks	Expedia, Inc.[note 3]	Online travel	United States	$&0000001372000000.0000001,372,000,000	[16]
02003-08-08 August 8, 2003	USA Interactive	Expedia, Inc.[note 4]	Online travel	United States	$&0000003636000000.0000003,636,000,000	[17]
02005-08-09 August 9, 2005	IAC/InterActiveCorp	Expedia, Inc.[note 5]	Online travel	United States	$&0000007981000000.0000007,981,000,000	[18]

[edit] Locations

Expedia, Inc. maintains headquarters in downtown Bellevue, Washington, in a building named Expedia Tower. Expedia occupies floors 3 to 18 of the 20 floor building, which completed construction in 2008. Initially, it was widely speculated that Google wanted to occupy most of the building, but a crane accident in 2006 caused delay and Google backed out of the project. ^[19]

[edit] Accolades

In 2008, Expedia was named to the most admired Internet companies in the United States list, released by Fortune. Expedia ranked third, after IAC and Google, and was followed by Amazon.com at fourth place.^[20]

[edit] Notes

[edit] References

[edit] External links

Companies portal

• Company Homepage