TechCrunch.com just covered Oktogo, “one of the larger hotel-booking sites in Russia which acquired , acquired Travel.ru, for around $2 million”.
Travel.Ru was a site not just a domain name.
“Today, Oktogo announced that it will rebrand the entire company as Travel.ru, as it pivots into a new role as an integrated, one-stop travel shop that pairs travel commerce with travel information.”
“The new Travel.ru is also announcing another $5 million in funding led by VEB Innovations, to build out its branding and new business strategy.”
“The latest funding takes the total raised by the new Travel.ru to $31 million.”
“The new Travel.ru not only gives users the ability to search for and purchase airfare, hotels and tours, but to provide pre- and post-booking assistance in the form of tourist information about destinations and travel practicalities (Visa information features prominently on the home page). The new Travel.ru offers in-house and user-generated travel content as well as the option to book across some 5,500 hotels in Russia and 350,000 hotels worldwide, and currently has some 3 million monthly unique visitors.”
“Travel.ru was first founded in 1998, around the same time as Mail.ru — where Kolesnik was one of four co-founders. Interestingly, the Mail.ru domain name was acquired by her and her-founders for only $500 from the same team that started Travel.ru.
By 2000, Mail.ru was growing fast (and today it’s Russia’s biggest online company in terms of traffic). As part of a desired move into travel, it acquired a majority stake in Travel.ru. (Kolesnik left Mail.ru in 2001 after the merger with Yuri Milner’s Netbridge.)
Fast forward a few years, and it seems that Mail.ru’s travel business wasn’t bearing fruit, so Mail.ru sold its stake in Travel.ru as a non-core asset. Since then, Travel.ru has been developing as a stand-alone business — until September, when it was acquired by Kolesnik and her team.”
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