A legal battle between Chinese travel heavyweights Qunar and eLong looks like it will carry on well into 2015.
Qunar has confirmed that it will contest a decision announced late December which alleged the travel search site was in breach of a contract with the Expedia-owned eLong.
The dispute has been running since 2013, when eLong first accused Qunar of "improperly terminating a three-year hotel inventory redistribution agreement" and took them to court in the September.
eLong said in 2013 that the terminated deal committed Qunar to selling 5.4 million room nights ( or 450,000 per quarter) from eLong's inventory between July 2013 and June 2016. If Qunar fell short, it was to pay 27 RMB ($4.30) for each room night less than the target.
The decision announced by the court on New Year's Eve requires that Qunar and eLong resurrect the original deal, with the 27RMB/$4.30 per room night penalty for failing to reach the target still in place, as an advertising credit rather than a cash sum.
Qunar also needs to compensate eLong to the tune of $8.5 million-worth of advertising credits, while eLong needs to pay Qunar around $1.3m in commission for hotels sold under the agreement before it was terminated.
Jenna Qian, head of communications at Qunar, told Tnooz: "We will appeal this decision."
She added: "The judgment will have little impact on our business. Our hotel direct business has grown very rapidly and hotel volume contribution of direct sales exceeded that of our platform business in the third quarter of 2014".
NB: Handshake image by Shutterstock