Five Notable Acquisitions in Priceline History

Priceline is one of the biggest discount travel websites in the world. The site famously employs celebrities such as William Shatner and Kaley Cuoco, and people love it. It’s the site on which you can name your own price and find a hotel willing to accept your probably much-too-low bid on a worth-so-much-more kind of room. One of the many reasons this company is so successful is that they have a long list of acquisitions that are notable. Here are five such acquisitions.

Active Hotels

Active Hotels was a European travel site that was designed to help people book their rooms overseas at a discount. In 2004, Priceline acquired the business for a whopping $120.2 million. The acquisition was a big one for Priceline, who then overtook the European hotel booking market with this expensive purchase.

Agoda

This is a company with almost 400,000 locations worldwide. The company works a bit like Priceline, but it focuses on the Asian market. In 2007, Priceline agreed to purchase this company for a large sum, which put the company in a much better financial position.

TravelJigSaw

This was a site known for booking rental cars for people flying into distant cities. It was one that Priceline decided to acquire in 2010 and rename. The site is now known as Rentalcars.com, and it’s one of the leading rental car websites in the world. All in all, a good purchase for the travel site.

Kayak

This was an expensive acquisition for Priceline. The travel company made the decision to purchase Kayak, another travel booking company, in 2012. The cost to Priceline was $500 million in cash. The company also paid an additional $1.3 billion in assets and stock options to finalize this particular purchase.

OpenTable

This is a site that is designed to help people see different restaurants and book their dining reservations all from your phone or computer anywhere in the world. During the summer of 2014, Priceline acquired this website for a staggering price of $2.6 billion.

(Photo Illustration by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Written by Tiffany Raiford

Tiffany Raiford is a lifelong Floridian, wife to my high school sweetheart and mother of four littles (two girls and boy/girl twins...no, they are not identical and yes, I'm sure). My kids love to whine, so I love to wine. My loves include nap time, bed time, date night, travel and evenings and weekends when my husband is home because he handles all diaper changes.