Recently, Rotterdam-based Vakanties.nl, a travel tech startup has acquired Zoover Media for an undisclosed amount. With this acquisition, the travel startup aims to become the market leader in the Online Travel Agency (OTA) segment in the Netherlands and Belgium.
Judith Eyck, Managing Director of Vakanties.nl: “Compare us to Netflix, which uses data to offer personalized content. Zoover is an independent rating platform with a broad reach and over 3.8 million reviews. This allows us to scale up and to further personalise travelling so that the finding and booking of a holiday are made even easier.”
Founded in 2017 by Judith Eyck and Joost Romeijn, Vakanties.nl uses machine learning to bundle services and help travellers find what they are looking for. Notably, the company took its profits from €1 million to €10 million within a year. On the other hand, Zoover was founded in 2004 by Erwin Rooymans and Bas Rasker and grew into the most famous review site in the field of holidays in the Netherlands.
Post-acquisition, Vakanties.nl will be active only as a tour operator and not as a platform. The twenty employees from Zoover in Amsterdam will now relocate to the Vakanties.nl’s Rotterdam office, where twenty people also work.
Managing Director of Zoover, Martijn Olthof, will turn over his tasks to Eyck. Olthof: “Zoover is a strong brand and has acquired the consumer’s trust. We are exuberant that this acquisition is taking place since Vakanties.nl is the right partner to sustainably stabilize Zoover as a brand and to increase growth in The Netherlands and Belgium.”
WebAssets, the parent company of rating- and booking-platform Zoover, will remain in the hands of German HolidayCheck AG.
Eyck describes this phase as a new start, “though accompanied by the knowledge of three challenging years. A greater number of people know about our company and our algorithms are smarter. It is more difficult for our competitors to scale up because they are not tech companies and suffer from legacy. We are David that opposes Goliath. The opportunities are up for grabs, as long as we remain fast-paced and flexible enough.”
Main image credits: Zoover
01
Not solo: How Xolo aims to help Dutch solopreneurs with its comprehensive business management platform