MADRID—Amadeus has agreed to acquire TravelClick from Thoma Bravo, a private equity investment firm, for $1.52 billion. As part of the acquisition, approximately 1,100 TravelClick employees are expected to join Amadeus.
TravelClick, which is headquartered in New York City, is a global hospitality provider of cloud-based solutions, including an independent and mid-size hotel Central Reservation System (CRS) and Guest Management Solution (GMS), as well as business intelligence and media solutions. The addition of TravelClick’s solutions to the Amadeus portfolio will expand the range of technology the company offers hotels and chains of all sizes across the globe.
“TravelClick has a great team, great technology, and a broad customer base, and we are looking forward to welcoming such a successful business into Amadeus,” says Luis Maroto, president and CEO of Amadeus. “Our ambition is to provide the hospitality industry with the tools they need to grow their businesses and deliver a great experience to their guests. The combination of our two portfolios will allow us to provide that to hotels of all shapes and sizes across the world.”
“This deal marks the next stage in TravelClick’s incredible journey of success in delivering ground-breaking solutions for hoteliers,” said Larry Kutscher, CEO of TravelClick. “I couldn’t be more proud of our team or more excited about the impact our combined companies will have on the hospitality industry as we begin to deliver the next generation of innovation for hoteliers.”
Francisco Perez-Lozao, senior vice president of strategic growth businesses at Amadeus, explained that the acquisition will give Amadeus access to more hotel segments outside of large brands. “While we have already made strong progress with the large chains, TravelClick gives us access to the mid-chain and independent hotel segment that makes up almost three-quarters of the market. We can now serve the entire industry with a very broad portfolio of solutions and we are looking for significant growth in the years ahead,” Perez-Lozao explained.
Amadeus and Thoma Bravo expect to close the acquisition in the fourth quarter of the calendar year 2018, following regulatory approvals. The transaction will be debt-financed and immediately earnings accretive.
