MSN Travel

MSN Travel
Type of site
 Travel services
Owner Microsoft
Website www.msn.com/travel/flights
Launched September 15, 2010 (2010-09-15)

MSN Travel (previously Bing Travel, Live Search Farecast, and Farecast.com) is an airfare prediction website in the computer reservations system industry. Bing Travel premiered to the public as Farecast on May 15, 2007. MSN Travel offered predictions regarding the best time to purchase airline tickets until 2014.[1][2]

History

Farecast was founded four years before its launch in 2003; according to Farecast, it had collected over 175 billion airfare observations as of 2007.[3] Farecast's team of data miners used these airfare observations to build algorithms to predict future airfare price movements.

In April 2008, Farecast was bought by Microsoft at a price believed to be around $75 million to 115 million.[4] Microsoft officially integrated it as part of its Live Search group of tools in May 2008. On June 3, 2009, Microsoft officially rebranded Live Search Farecast as Bing Travel as part of its efforts to create a new search identity.[5]

In January 2014, the airfare prediction feature was removed "to focus resources on areas where we feel there are the greatest opportunities to serve travel needs".[6]

As of May 2015, Microsoft has rebranded Bing Travel to MSN Travel. The link now redirects to the MSN Travel website.[7]

In August 2015, MSN Travel flight search pages changed from being powered by KAYAK to their competitor Skyscanner.

Controversy

In 2009, there were allegations that Bing Travel had copied its layouts from Kayak.com. Microsoft denied the allegations and stated that "Bing Travel is based on independent development by Microsoft and Farecast.com, which Microsoft acquired in 2008. Any contrary allegations are without merit."[8] By January 2013, Bing Travel results were powered by KAYAK.com, as noted by this copy at the bottom of search results: "Results powered by KAYAK.com".

See also

References

  1. ↑ Mohl, Bruce (June 4, 2006). "While other sites list airfares, newcomer forecasts where they're headed". boston.com.
  2. ↑ "Bing Travel's airfare price predictor is gone, but not forgotten". Engadget. Retrieved April 21, 2018.
  3. ↑ "Farecast.com Launches Airfare Deals Based On Science, Not Marketing". Farecast.com. March 13, 2007. Archived from the original on March 17, 2007.
  4. ↑ "Microsoft buys travel search site". theregister.co.uk. April 18, 2008.
  5. ↑ Johnson, Nathania (June 1, 2009). "Bing's Best Features are the Ones You Didn't Know Existed on Live Search". Search Engine Watch.
  6. ↑ "Farewell, Farecast: Microsoft kills airfare price predictor, to the dismay of its creator". GeekWire. April 8, 2014. Retrieved April 21, 2018.
  7. ↑ O'Neill, Sean (January 20, 2015). "Microsoft all but closes Bing Travel, expands MSN Travel". TNOOZ.
  8. ↑ "Kayak to Bing: Stop Copying Us! - Update". wired.com. June 24, 2009.
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