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Google Acquires ITA Software, Regulators May Balk

Posted by Soulskill on from the put-me-in-coach dept.

marino02 tips news that Google has acquired ITA Software, a company who sells travel-related software and information, for $700 million. "Google said it plans to use ITA's technology in its Web search tools and to allow potential passengers to shop for tickets right from Google. Travel search makes up a huge portion of Google searches, but it's a complicated type of search to express in a query box, [said Marissa Mayer]." Analysts expect the deal to come under scrutiny from the FTC. "With this deal, Google will have transformed itself into one of the biggest power brokers in the travel industry. It will control the leading software for powering online airline reservations. It will be able to provide something in its own search results above and beyond what its competitors — who merely license the ITA software — will be able to produce. And it will become the leading online advertising buy for travel-related advertisers (assuming it wasn't already) if it doesn't butcher the rollout of user-friendly airline search tools within Google's already popular interface."

10 of 72 comments (clear)

  1. I am by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    getting sick of Google EVERYWHERE.

    Where is the FTC. Ooooops, I forgot. It's an oligarchy.

    Yours In Krasnoyarsk,
    Kilgore Trout

  2. Re:One of ITA's Customers is Bing by mandelbr0t · · Score: 3, Interesting

    In all fairness, these are the unwritten rules that the IT market plays by. However, if Google were to start playing these games, it would definitely go against their "Don't be evil" motto. A little regulation would probably go a long way in forcing big business to be reasonable in their competitive practice.

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    "Please describe the scientific nature of the 'whammy'" - Agent Scully
  3. But corporate travel... by Animats · · Score: 3, Interesting

    "Google has no plans to sell airline tickets to consumers", they say. However, Google Corporate Travel could be a big moneymaker. Companies will pay for outsourcing services to handle and account for their employee travel.

  4. Re:But you'll still only be able to find southwest by h4rr4r · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Too bad they don't offer international flights. Heck, I wish we would let international carriers offer domestic flights. Lufthansa is no wonder carrier but the service made any US carrier look like Hobo-Air.

  5. Re:But you'll still only be able to find southwest by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Free peanuts and a soda? Meh. How about an assigned seat?

    I personally _love_ to stand 40 minutes to an hour prior to my flights just so I can get a decent seat. I mean what else would I be doing, trolling slashdot? Sheesh.

    Cattle call!

  6. API by jDeepbeep · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Definitely. I feel reasonably safe in assuming they'll publish a Flights API along with that. Some nice apps could be built on that in conjunction with voice-search.

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    Reply to That ||
  7. Thank god for that by JohnnyUK · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I'm glad. Airline websites have had forever to get this right and yet, for me, one of the most frustrating things to do on the internet is find a flight in any sensible fashion.

  8. Re:But you'll still only be able to find southwest by Mortlath · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I have a daughter with a peanut allergy you insensitive clod!

    But seriously, since Southwest doesn't clean up between flights (only once in the morning), we can no longer take Southwest anymore. Even if they ban peanuts on our flight, there is too much old peanuts on the seats, floor, and air. Last time my daughter started getting a bad reaction and we had to douse her with medicine to keep it from getting life-threatening.

    People don't realize that just a little bit of peanuts around can cause those with allegeries to stop breathing.

  9. ITA? Never heard of it by CaptainOfSpray · · Score: 3, Interesting

    >It will control the leading software for powering online airline reservations

    Anybody ever heard of Galileo? Amadeus anyone?


    Is this ITA something that is only used in the US? BTW, whatever happened to SABRE?

    --
    "Cock Up Your Beaver" does not mean what you think. This sig is intended to clog filters and annoy do-gooders
    1. Re:ITA? Never heard of it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      ITA is to Sabre as Google is to index cards.

      One of the founders of ITA examined the rules published by the central authority through which all airlines publish their flight availability data. The ITA founder proved those rules make problems that are NP-complete. He used ITA's search engine to implement a Turing machine using only the rules as defined by the central authority. He used that Turing machine to perform other calculations, all centered around proving certain properties of the data structures defined by the rules. There is a deep art around what ITA does. Sabre was built years ago before anyone suspected that the base of data being searched was anywhere close to as complex as ITA proved it to be. Once ITA understood the true nature of the problem they were trying to solve, they built an engine optimized to search the space. The difference between ITA's results and Sabre's results are .. like Google compared to someone searching index cards.

      ITA is the search engine behind Orbitz, Kayak (I believe and am not going to double check), and several other top search engines. ITA doesn't sell tickets, ITA provides data to people who sell tickets.