Opodo

Opodo is an online travel agency which offers deals in regular and charter flights, low-cost airlines, hotels, cruises, car rental, dynamic packages, holiday packages and travel insurance. It is a pan-European enterprise, founded by a consortium of European airlines, including British Airways, Air France, Alitalia, Iberia, KLM, Lufthansa, Aer Lingus, Austrian Airlines and Finnair. The travel technology provider Amadeus owned 99.4% of the company until 2011.

Opodo
Founded2001 (2001)
HeadquartersLondon, United Kingdom
Area servedEurope
IndustryTravel
ProductsCharter and scheduled passenger airlines, package holidays, cruise lines, hotels and resorts
ServicesTravel agency
URLwww.opodo.com
Alexa rank 127,343 (June 2020)[1]

Opodo operates out of fourteen European countries, with headquarters in London, UK. It operates Opodo-branded sites in Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Austria, Belgium, Poland and Switzerland, as well as Travellink-branded sites in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Finland. It also operates several other French travel websites.

History

Opodo launched its first site in Germany in November 2001, its UK site in January 2002, its French site in April 2002 and its Italian site in January 2006. Giovanni Bisignani, former CEO of Alitalia and present CEO of IATA (International Air Transport Association) was Opodo's first CEO. Nicolas De Santis former CMO of web currency beenz.com and president of strategy consultancy and incubator CorporateVision.io was Opodo's first director of marketing, sales and strategy. In 2002, David P. Scowsill was appointed as Opodo's CEO, replacing interim CEO Simon Tucker.[2][3]

Prior to founding of Opodo, Orbitz was negotiating with European air carriers, trying to get a deal with them, but they were hesitant to participate in a company where the majority was owned by US carriers.[4]

In 2004, the company was bought by Amadeus for 62 million euros.[5]

Since 2011, Opodo is part of the largest online travel company in Europe, eDreams ODIGEO.[6][7]

IPO

Parent company eDreams went public in 2014.

Independent Board Member James Hare (James Otis Hare II) oversaw the public launch on April 4, 2014.[8]

eDreams offered its stock at 10.25 Euros per share.[9]

That stock price had fallen to 1.02 Euros by October 24 of 2014, wiping out over one billion Euros of market capitalization.[10]

Some commentators called the launch “Europe’s worst performing IPO of 2014”.[11]

eDreams moved quickly, asking their shareholders for authorization to “Discharge to Mr. James Otis Hare for the exercise of his mandate as director of the Company until his resignation as of 25 March, 2015.”[12]

eDreams issued the following announcement: “Effective March 25, 2015, eDreams ODIGEO (“the Company”) accepts the resignation of Mr. James Hare as an Independent member from the Board of Directors”.[13]

In June 2015, CEO Dana Dunne introduced a new strategy focusing on mobile, revenue diversification and customer experience improvements, which led to a strong turnaround in business performance.[14]

Criticism

Opodo.com and opodo.co.uk have a “poor” rating of 2 stars out 5 on the online review platform Trustpilot,[15] and a rating of 1.2 out of 5 on the review platform Reviewcentre.[16] The majority of customer complaints focus on a serious lack of responsiveness from the Opodo customer care team, for instance not receiving a reply to an email in over a month, for them being "unreachable by phone," as well as many instances in which tickets booked and confirmed through Opodo are never actually reserved with the airline.[17]

References
  1. "opodo.com Competitive Analysis, Marketing Mix and Traffic - Alexa". alexa.com. Retrieved 2020-06-13.
  2. "Opodo appoints full-time CEO". Travel Weekly (UK). 2002-09-19. Retrieved 2019-10-22.
  3. "David Scowsill". Les Echos (in French). 2002-10-02. Retrieved 2019-10-22.
  4. Schaal, Dennis (2016). "The Definitive oral history of online travel". Skift.com. Retrieved 15 June 2016.
  5. "Amadeus: 62 Millionen Euro für Opodo" [62 million euros for Opodo]. manager magazin (in German). Manager Magazin. 2004-06-16. Retrieved 2019-10-22.
  6. "eDreams ODIGEO - Leading online travel agency". eDreams ODIGEO. Retrieved 9 August 2017.
  7. May, Kevin (November 17, 2011). "Opodo-eDreams-GoVoyages powerhouse Odigeo plots next move, eyes startups and full service". Phocuswire.
  8. "HECHO RELEVANTE" (PDF). Edreamsodigeo.com. Retrieved 2016-09-16.
  9. "After IPO, eDreams Odigeo shares plummet 75% in 5 months". Tech.eu. 2014-09-11. Retrieved 2016-09-07.
  10. "SIBE Stock Quote". Bloomberg.com. 2016-06-09. Retrieved 2016-09-07.
  11. O'Neil, Sean (August 29, 2014). "Down 60%, eDreams Odigeo shares try to escape post-IPO nightmare". Phocuswire.
  12. "eDreams ODIGEO : VOTING FORM" (PDF). Edreamsodiegeo.com. Retrieved 2017-08-09.
  13. "eDreams ODIGEO : VOTING FORM" (PDF). Edreamsodiegeo.com. Retrieved 2017-08-09.
  14. Fox, Linda (November 24, 2015). "eDreams Odigeo strategy begins to pay off". Phocuswire.
  15. "Opodo is rated "Average" with 6.8 / 10 on Trustpilot". Trustpilot. Retrieved 9 August 2017.
  16. "ReviewCentre". Reviewcentre.com. Retrieved 2017-08-09.
  17. Tims, Anna (12 September 2014). "Complaints are different, but Opodo's response is the same – ignore it". The Guardian.
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