If you can't beat them, join them, appears to the mantra in the world of European online travel agencies with news that Ebookers is to launch a travel agency affiliate scheme.
Beginning first in the UK and Ireland, then elsewhere around the OTA's other European sites, Ebookers For Agents will allow partners to access and book hotel, package holiday, flight and car products from Ebookers in return for a commission.
Around 90,000 hotels, for example, will be available as part of the programme.
Such schemes are gaining in popularity in the OTA sector as they look to push their product range to corners of the offline world where a range of hotel options, at least, may have been limited in the past.
So the launch of such a scheme shouldn't come as much of a surprise given that parent company Orbitz Worldwide launched its agent affiliate scheme in February 2010.
But crucially, Tamer Tamar, managing director of Ebookers, is widely credited with developing and running the successful Expedia programme before switching sides in June 2009.
Expedia expanded its own agent affiliate programme (TAAP) into the US last week after beginning in a number of territories across Europe, Australia and Canada.