News

Online US giant Kayak officially launches in UK – 19 Feb 2007

Online travel search company Kayak officially launches in the UK today.

The meta-search firm received more than 2 million visits since a beta or test version of Kayak.co.uk was launched in December last year.

The complete site launches today with more than 400 UK online travel providers including British Airways, Air France, BMI, Ryanair and EasyJet.

Kayak is the first travel firm to use Amadeus’ Meta Pricer system, which searches the technology firm’s global distribution system to find flight details.

Traditionally, meta-search sites search the entire web for details that results in increased technology costs for online suppliers that have to cope with a high number of searches.

Amadeus is working on an updated version of the system that will allow bookings to be made within the Amadeus system.

Kayak founder and chief executive Steve Hafner said the beta site was the 54th most visited travel site in the UK and with traffic generated from new affiliate programmes he expects it to break into the top ten by the end of the summer.

Share article

View Comments

Jacobs Media is honoured to be the recipient of the 2020 Queen's Award for Enterprise.

The highest official awards for UK businesses since being established by royal warrant in 1965. Read more.