Online travel search company Kayak has officially launched in the UK this week, following a two-month Beta period. The meta-search firm received more than 2 million visits since 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…
Kayak abandons Beta tag in the UK
Online travel search company Kayak has officially launched in the UK this week, following a two-month Beta period.
The meta-search firm received more than 2 million visits since 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.
The US-owned company is expected to launch hotel and car hire meta search facilities by the end of 2007.
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.
