HolidayCheck Group
 | |
| Type | Public |
|---|---|
| Industry | Digital media content provider |
| Founded | 2001 |
| Headquarters | Munich, Germany |
Key people | Christoph Ludmann, CEO Uta Fesefeldt, CFO[1] |
| Products | Online portals |
| Revenue | €14.47 million (2020)[2] |
Number of employees | 470 |
| Parent | Hubert Burda Media  |
| Website | www |
HolidayCheck Group AG is an exchange-listed internet company based in Munich, Germany.[3] It operates online portals for package-holiday reviews and bookings in Germany, Austria and Switzerland under the HolidayCheck brand.
The group was formed in 2001 as Tomorrow Focus AG through the merger of Focus Digital AG and Tomorrow Internet AG,[4] and was renamed HolidayCheck Group AG in 2016.[5]
Origin
[edit]HolidayCheck began in 1999 as a private hotel-review website set up by students in Konstanz, Germany, among them Markus Schott, Hakan Öktem, Jens Freiter, Jörg Kampshoff and Sascha Vasic.[6][7][8] After the broadcaster RTL reported on the site in 2003,[9] its founders registered it as a commercial venture, which began operating on 11 November 2003.
Operations
[edit]Users of HolidayCheck can book trips, compare offers and rate hotels and holidays. According to the company, the portal had about 2.5 million members and 8 million reviews in 2017.[10]
Alongside the main portal, the group operates the car-rental comparison site MietwagenCheck through Drive Boo AG, and the Zoover review portals and the Meteovista and Weeronline weather services through WebAssets B.V.[11]
Ownership and acquisitions
[edit]In July 2006, Hubert Burda Media acquired 80 percent of HolidayCheck AG for €60 million through its subsidiaries Tomorrow Focus AG (51 percent) and Burda Digital Ventures (29 percent).[12] Burda Digital Ventures sold its stake to Tomorrow Focus in 2007, the year HolidayCheck also acquired the portal Hotelcheck.de,[13] and in 2008 it acquired the rival portal Urlaub.com.[14]
In January 2009, Tomorrow Focus raised its holding to 94 percent for a further €21.6 million,[15] and became the sole owner after the founders sold their remaining 6 percent in June 2013. The parent company made further travel-sector investments in 2015 while divesting online-publishing assets such as Focus Online and the Huffington Post,[16] and changed its name to HolidayCheck Group AG in 2016.[17]
Reviews and litigation
[edit]HolidayCheck's user-generated reviews have been the subject of consumer testing and litigation. In a 2013 comparison of hotel-review portals by Stiftung Warentest, HolidayCheck rated best of the seven sites tested, with the testers noting its automated screening of submissions and a team that reviewed suspicious entries.[18] In a judgment of 19 March 2015 (case I ZR 94/13), the Federal Court of Justice held that a review-portal operator need not verify user reviews before publication and is liable for false statements only after being notified of a specific violation.[19] In 2023 the Regional Court of Munich I ruled in the company's favour against the agency Goldstar Marketing, holding that the sale of fabricated reviews was unlawful and ordering it to pay damages and to disclose the reviews' origin.[20]
Financial results
[edit]For the 2018 financial year the company reported operating EBITDA of €10.7 million on total revenue of €138.9 million, and for 2023 total revenue of about €147 million.[21][22] Its shares trade in the Prime Standard segment of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange.[23]
In 2019 the company had about 470 employees at sites in Bottighofen, Munich, Poznań and Warsaw.[24] In a management change effective 1 February 2024, Christoph Ludmann became chief executive officer and Uta Fesefeldt chief financial officer.[1]
References
[edit]- 1 2 "Führungswechsel bei Holiday Check". aboutTravel (in German). 5 February 2024. Retrieved 21 July 2026.
- ↑ "Annual Report 2020" (PDF). HolidayCheckGroup. Retrieved 29 November 2021.
- ↑ "HolidayCheck Group AG, München". North Data (in German). Retrieved 21 July 2026.
- ↑ "Neue Internet-AG: Focus und Tomorrow wollen fusionieren". Der Spiegel. 8 August 2001.
- ↑ "HolidayCheck press release". HolidayCheck Group. HolidayCheck Group. Retrieved 12 December 2017.
- ↑ Wolf, Uwe (January 2008). "Holidaycheck.de Urlaubsretter im Internet" (PDF). digital life. Die Welt von morgen. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-09-26. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
- ↑ Molitor, Andreas (April 2016). "Keine Experimente!". brand eins. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
- ↑ Kläsgen, Michael (18 May 2018). "Das Timing muss stimmen". Süddeutsche Zeitung. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
- ↑ Holzapfel, Tim (18 May 2007). "Die WG-AG". fvw. Magazin für Touristik & Business Travel.
- ↑ "Mediadaten". HolidayCheck. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
- ↑ "HolidayCheck Group". HolidayCheck Group. Retrieved 21 July 2026.
- ↑ Jacobsen, Nils (24 November 2008). "HolidayCheck: Der wahre Wert der ToFo". Meedia. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
- ↑ Teggatz, Timo (22 June 2007). "Offensiver Neuling". fvw. Magazin für Touristik & Business Travel.
- ↑ "Holidaycheck macht Urlaub". fvw. Magazin für Touristik & Business Travel. 9 May 2008.
- ↑ "Tomorrow Focus AG übernimmt weitere 14 Prozent an der HolidayCheck AG". tomorrow-focus.de. 12 February 2009. Archived from the original on 25 March 2015. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
- ↑ "TOMORROW FOCUS AG verkauft ElitePartner an Oakley Capital". Focus. 8 June 2015. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
- ↑ "Tomorrow Focus wird Holidaycheck". Börsen-Zeitung. 6 May 2016.
- ↑ "Die besten Portale im Netz". Stiftung Warentest. "Reise.Reisen" (in German). 2010-01-28. Retrieved 2026-07-21.
- ↑ "Holidaycheck muss nicht verhindern, dass Nutzer lügen". Legal Tribune Online (in German). 20 March 2015. Retrieved 21 July 2026.
- ↑ "Krieg der falschen Sterne: wegweisendes Urteil im Kampf gegen Fake-Bewertungen". Neue Zürcher Zeitung (in German). 2023. Retrieved 21 July 2026.
- ↑ "HolidayCheck publishes annual results for 2018". MarketScreener. Retrieved 16 July 2019.
- ↑ "HolidayCheck Group revenue 2019–2023". Statista. Retrieved 21 July 2026.
- ↑ "HolidayCheck Group AG (HOC.HM)". Yahoo Finance. Retrieved 21 July 2026.
- ↑ "HolidayCheck Group AG: Private Company Information". Bloomberg. Retrieved 24 July 2019.