Skyscanner Partners with Sequoia Capital

Sequoia Capital’s investment values Skyscanner at $800M Sir Michael Moritz joins Skyscanner’s Board

EDINBURGH, Scotland–(BUSINESS WIRE)–October 3, 2013–

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Skyscanner, the world’s fastest growing international travel search company, today announced that it has partnered with Sequoia Capital. Sir Michael Moritz will represent Sequoia on Skyscanner’s Board of Directors.

Sequoia Capital’s secondary investment values Skyscanner at $800m and will give the company access to a deep pool of experience at a time when the company is undergoing a period of rapid, self-funded growth. It’s one of the largest investments in any company Sequoia Capital has made to date. Scottish Equity Partners remains the company’s largest investor, providing its expertise as one of Europe’s top venture capital firms.

Skyscanner has grown more than 100% year on year for the past four years. It more than doubled its staff last year and will double staff again to 500 over the next year. Its mobile app has been downloaded over 25 million times and its web site attracts over 25 million unique users a month. Skyscanner has just opened a new office in Miami as a base from which to build its business in the US, Canadian and Latin American markets. It is already showing triple digit growth elsewhere around the world.

Gareth Williams, Skyscanner’s Chief Executive Officer, commented: “Sequoia Capital’s investment in Skyscanner brings us a depth of experience drawn from a pantheon of tech brands. We want to provide comprehensive and inspiring answers to travellers worldwide for all aspects of their trips. We intend to offer our users more of the great technology and functionality they’re already familiar with.”

Michael Moritz, Chairman of Sequoia Capital, said: “Much remains to be done to make mobile and online travel easier for consumers from Accra to Zagreb and Skyscanner is paving these paths. Skyscanner’s success in helping people find the world’s most accurate flight information is just the beginning of what’s possible. Skyscanner is one of the best technology companies ever to come out of Europe and is already a leading global player. Our job is to help take its current success a step further. Founders and CEOs like Skyscanner’s Gareth Williams are part of an extremely rare species with talents that most of us yearn for but don’t possess.”

Calum Paterson, Managing Partner at Scottish Equity Partners, who is also a member of the Skyscanner Board of Directors, said: “We have worked closely with Skyscanner since we first invested almost six years ago. During that time it has achieved exponential growth and been transformed into a world class company. It’s a privilege to work with such an outstanding team and to play a part in their remarkable journey. We are pleased to welcome Sequoia Capital and Michael Moritz and we look forward to their contribution as we look to help Skyscanner achieve even greater success in the future.”

Today’s news comes on the back of a recent acquisition by Skyscanner of Fogg, a Barcelona-based company that makes internet hotel search simpler and faster. The acquisition was a significant step in Skyscanner’s strategy of expanding its travel offering into other important areas of its users’ travel plans. Skyscanner’s comprehensive, proprietary flight search product has already demonstrated its appeal to consumers around the world. It has launched a powerful proprietary car rental engine also built from the ground-up.

About Skyscanner

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• Skyscanner is a leading global travel search site offering a truly comprehensive, free flight search service as well as instant online comparisons for hotels and car hire.
• Founded in 2003, Skyscanner receives over 25 million unique visitors each month.
• Skyscanner is optimised worldwide and is available in 30 languages.
• Skyscanner’s highly-rated free mobile apps are available on iPhone, iPad, Android, Windows Phone, BlackBerry and Windows 8 devices and have been downloaded over 25 million times.
• The privately-owned company employs over 250 staff and has its global headquarters in Edinburgh with regional hubs in Singapore, Beijing, Barcelona and Miami.

For more information, visit our press office or our company blog.

About Sequoia Capital

Sequoia Capital helps founders turn imaginative ideas into enduring companies. As the “Entrepreneurs Behind the Entrepreneurs,” the Sequoia team has worked closely with legendary founders such as Steve Jobs of Apple, Larry Ellison of Oracle, Len Bosack and Sandy Lerner of Cisco, David Filo and Jerry Yang of Yahoo!, Max Levchin, Elon Musk and Peter Thiel of PayPal, Sergey Brin and Larry Page of Google, Steve Chen and Chad Hurley of YouTube, Reid Hoffman and Jeff Weiner of LinkedIn and, more recently, Drew Houston and Arash Ferdowsi of DropBox, Brian Chesky, Nathan Blecharczyk and Joe Gebbia of AirBnB and Jan Koum and Brian Acton of WhatsApp. Sequoia is now helping the next generation of innovators build the lasting companies of tomorrow in the U.S., China, India and Israel.

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Media:
For Skyscanner
Nick Freer
+44(0)7841 571 871
nick@freerconsultancy.com
or
Victoria Bailie
+44(0)131 252 5719
victoria@skyscanner.net