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Ray Nolan in the news

Hostel Trends and News

Josh started this discussion 16 years 9 months ago

An article about Ray Nolan (WRI, Hostelworld) about a potential €100m when they float on the stock exchange -- an Internet success story:

He's the Irish software millionaire most of us had never heard of. Just nine years after he and his partner Tom Kennedy founded WRI, Ray Nolan will end up with shares worth up to €100m when the online accommodation booking company floats on the stock exchange.

[...]

Nolan himself still has a near-25pc stake in WRI. If the company achieves its planned valuation of €450m in its forthcoming flotation, then Nolan's shareholding will be worth well in excess of €100m.

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santa klaus

16 years

I hope they don't do those things. A higher commission would make more hostels run to support Hostelbookers. Making hostels pay for ratings would probably ruin their credibility...

So what? The nice thing about being a vulture capitalist is that you don´t have to worry about long-term strategies. You sell your shares after a while with a profit and let the guy who buys them find out for himself that you have ruined the company successfully.

though there is always the chance that they could be acquired by a company that doesn't understand hostels.

Exactly.

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Tim

16 years

I agree that boo.com is where the WRI's future is. It is a nice looking website that could easily be a market leader in the hotel booking market. There's more money and a bigger market than hostels but you need a lot of money and the right people to pull it off.

Any move away from hostels is good for us, but for it may take a while for most hostels to move to a more hostel-friendly booking service.

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Josh Hostels

16 years

Somewhat related story -- a company that doesn't understand hostels, and that doesn't even offer hostel bookings is pushing its way into the hostel industry:
http://www.hostelmanagement.com/forum/f25/igougo-com-sabre-travelocity-hostels-570.html

I just added an update in that thread. Sabre/Travelocity/Igougo is already squeezing into the top of the search engine rankings for hostel keywords and then doing a bait-and-switch to hotel bookings.

Here is an example -- IgoUgo.com doesn't offer hostel bookings but is starting to rank for hostel keywords and individual hostels' names.

IMAGE(http://www.hostelmanagement.com/forum/attachments/f25/103d1215843183-igougo-com-sabre-travelocity-hostels-arnotts_lodge_igougo.png)

More here:
http://www.hostelmanagement.com/forum/f25/igougo-com-sabre-travelocity-hostels-570.html

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