Travelclick, which provides business intelligence and marketing solutions for hotels, acquired competitor Rubicon.
In a conference call to announce the move, Larry Kutscher, Travelclick CEO, says the companies will merge their somewhat disparate products onto Travelclick's Hotelligence360 platform to provide a broader business intelligence platform for hotels.
The two companies have different strengths, Kutscher explains.
While Travelclick has been strong at the property level, focusing on providing information to hotels about their strengths among travel agencies, Rubicon has honed in on the rate space and has leveraged relationships with hotel chains, Kutscher says.
The acquisition, which has been under discussion for months, will enable Travelclick, headquartered in Schaumburg, Ill., to provide customers with stronger data and solutions, Kutscher says.
In addition, the merger may open new markets for Travelclick since Rubicon, with offices in Atlanta, Minneapolis and London, also offers solutions for airlines and car rental firms, Kutscher says.
Tim Hart, the CEO of Rubicon, will stay on with the merged companies and will head their combined business intelligence division.
He acknowledged that the goal is to merge the two companies' products onto a single platform.
The merger could be raising some eyebrows over at Pegasus Solutions, which competes with Travelclick in providing hotels with CRS solutions,according to one hotel technology veteran who declined to be identified.
In 2009, Pegasus partnered with Rubicon to offer a suite of tools in the Pegasus MarketVision product.
“The fact that Travelclick is buying Rubicon shows Travelclick is still in the game because they’ve been quiet as church mice lately,” the hotel techie says.
Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.