Travel tech trio to make Sunday Times top 100

Three travel-related companies have been named in a list of the 100 fastest-growing technology companies.

Four travel-related companies have been named in a list of the 100 fastest-growing technology companies.

Cheap flights search engine Skyscanner.net was ranked 21st, digital marketing agency Greenlight was placed 24th, online accommodation engine Hostelbookers.com came in at 62 and price comparison website Cheapflights Media scraped in at 100.

They were all named in The Sunday Times’ Tech Track 100 list which was released yesterday and which reveals Britain’s fastest-growing private technology, telecoms and digital media companies.

Skyscanner was placed highly after reporting an 86.6% annual sales growth to £8.8 million for the year ending May 2010.

The profit-making company, which was set up in 2001 and employs 77 staff, claims that 10 million people visit its site each month to compare prices on 670,000 routes flown by more than 600 airlines.

Gareth Williams, the company’s chief executive, said much of the sales boost had been driven by budget-conscious travellers searching for online deals following the economic downturn.

“Skyscanner’s advanced technology combined with commercial relationships with all of the key airlines and online travel agents has taken the business to the top spot in Europe,” he added.

Greenlight was just three places behind having reported a profit growth of 79.8% to £15.7 million for the year ending August 2009.

The company said its ranking was thanks to its constant development of its own systems including Quant, Market Monitor, SearchSentry and Link Cluster.

Hostelbookers was ranked 62nd having seen annual sales growth of 45.8% to £8.3 million for the year ending December 2009.

The company was founded in 2003 and now offers travellers the opportunity to book rooms in 20,000 hostels, guesthouses and campsites in 3,000 cities worldwide.

Cheapflights Media was last in the list having reported a sales growth of 34.7% to £30.2 million for the year ending December 2009.

Cheapflights’ eight websites serve 10 countries. In the past year it also launched Zugu, which compares prices for travellers with less flexible itineraries and which operates in Britain, Germany and the US.

John Barrington-Carver, Cheapflights’ head of corporate communications, said the company was celebrating after making the Tech Track 100 list for the seventh year running.

He added: “As other growth technology, media and telecommunications companies will discover, the higher the base sales turnover gets for the three-year judging period the more difficult it is to get those winning percentage figures entitling a place in the Tech Track 100.

“Therefore as a mature dotcom with a 14 year track record of profitable growth behind us we were delighted to have achieved 100th place this year.”