By Kate Hanaghan, 30 July 2001 14:33
NEWS Online travel company ebookers has said steady growth over the last year has enabled it to double sales. First half sales were double that of the comparable period last year and the company has promised to hit positive cash flow by Q1 of next year. Significantly the whole of the online travel industry is enjoying good growth although ebookers claims to be the largest European travel site with a 20 per cent market share. It hopes to maintain this share as the market grows. The pan-European company has reduced pre-tax losses from £18.5m last year to £17.2m this year. While other IT and internet companies have floundered in current market conditions, ebookers has been significantly buoyed. Plummeting media marketing costs, such as online advertising, have been of huge benefit to the company. Navneet Bali, the company's finance director, explained that the company's focus is now on profits. He said: "We've already done the branding and now marketing will become more tactical and focussed to create repeat purchases." Recently ebookers announced it will be re-locating the non-customer facing parts of its business, including web chat rooms and email services, to India. The cost of these elements of a business tends to increase in line with sales growth so the company will be hoping to make significant savings as sales continue to expand. The Neuer Markt-listed company was up 15.7 per cent by lunchtime trading.
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