European OTA group aims to drive innovation in the travel e-commerce sector

European OTA group aims to drive innovation in the travel e-commerce sector

European OTA eDreams Odigeo has outlined plans to expand its global workforce by 50% by adding more than 500 extra staff by 2025.

The first phase of a three-year recruitment drive starts with plans to fill 200 vacancies, notably at new tech hubs in Porto and Milan as well as in its Barcelona, Madrid and Budapest offices.

The firm’s largest search for staff comes as it is transitions from a transaction-based model into a subscription business under the Prime label.

The business has grown its flight market to by six percentage points to 37% since the start of the pandemic and has claimed to have outperformed the wider industry, with trading exceeding pre-Covid levels by 30% in February.

The travel subscription programme, grew by 182% and topped 2.4 million members in the past 12 months.

The company expects that 66% of its total bookings will be made by subscribers as early as 2025, when it plans to have reached 7.25 million Prime members.

The investment in new technology and product roles will support the continued improvement of the Prime platform as well as its geographical expansion and the development of new product features.

The firm employs people from 46 nationalities and operates in a hybrid, flexible working system.

Chief executive Dana Dunne said: “We are on an exciting journey that is transforming our business and reinventing the travel experience for consumers.

“We are very proud of the excellent results that all ‘eDOers’, our team members, have achieved over the past years and are now thrilled to launch our next phase of growth as a subscription-led business.

“The new hires will bolster our capacity to innovate and develop new products and services for travellers, with a special focus on further expanding our winning travel subscription proposition, Prime.

“To maintain our strong growth, we are looking for the best and brightest international talent to join us and help us continue disrupting the market and driving tech innovation in the e-commerce sector.”