Vail Resorts now owns three out of the five major Australian ski fields following its acquisition of Mount Hotham and Falls Creek for $174 million from Merlin Entertainments last week. Both resorts are located in Victoria about a five hour drive from Melbourne. Vail has owned Perisher, Australia’s largest and most popular resort, since 2015. […]
Tag: Acquisition
Back to the future as Flight Centre buys Topdeck
Flight Centre has bought 90% of Topdeck Tours, a company started by FLT founder Graham Turner in 1973. Topdeck Managing Director James Nathan will retain a 10% shareholding in the business. Mr Nathan also runs Back-Roads Touring in which FLT has a 67% stake and will continue to manage both businesses. The deal values UK-based Topdeck Tours at £21.84m. […]
Luxury Escapes Buys Scoopon Travel & BonVoyage from Catch
The Lux Group, which owns online travel business Luxury Escapes, has bought Scoopon Travel and BonVoyage as part of a complicated, multi-faceted transaction with the Catch Group that will create a pure-play online travel business with $300m turnover and enormous buying power while clearing the way for further growth. In what the companies are calling Australia’s largest “home grown” e-commerce […]
Chinese company wins approval for Club Med purchase
French travel icon, Club Med, will be likely Chinese-owned by February 9 after regulators approved the takeover bid by Fosun International, which has offered €24.60 per share for the resort operator, valuing it at around €939 million. Fosun has been in a bidding war with Italian businessman Andrea Bonomi for Club Med since May, 2013, the […]
Virgin Australia disappears from view after Bain Capital acquisition
Update 18.1.21: Virgin eyes ‘former glory after major c-suite appointments Challenging times for Virgin Australia and its new owners, Bain Capital, which paid $3.5 billion for the broke and battling airline several months ago, but has given the carrier no voice or profile during Australia’s peak summer holiday season. All the talk has been left to […]
Not so happy campers as new Youcamp owner Hipcamp levies hefty service fees
Youcamp, which pioneered the concept of camping on private land in Australia, has been sold to US company Hipcamp, which in rapid succession has closed the site, migrated its content to the parent portal, rebranded it Hipcamp Australia and introduced a controversial customer service fee that can exceed 20 percent. Closing the Youcamp website has met […]