Palma.One of the world's leading hotel price check engines, Trivago, has opened its first overseas centres here in Palma on the rapidly expanding Parc Bit technology part which was designed by Lord Richard Rogers.
The site compares prices for over 600'000 hotels on over 140 booking sites, such as Expedia and Priceline.com. Based in Düsseldorf, Germany, the site has 18 million users per month on its 30 international platforms.
Trivago GmbH was conceived in 2004 and launched in 2005 by the three founders in Düsseldorf, Germany: Peter Vinnemeier, Malte Siewert, and Rolf Schrömgens.
In 2007, the website launched platforms in Spain, France, and the United Kingdom.
A year later, Poland and Sweden were added and the company received $1.14 million in Series B funding from the British company HOWZAT media LLP. In 2009, the first non-European platforms were made available in the U.S., China, Japan, Brazil, and Mexico. On 21 December, 2012, Expedia bought a majority stake in Trivago in a combined cash and stock deal worth 477 million euros and yesterday, Trivago opened its first centre outside Germany.
The Trivago Palma Innovation Centre' will be used to develop IT projects to improve the search engine and the services the company currently provides. One of the three founders, Peter Vinnemeier, presided over the opening of the satellite centre and said that it will also include some of its marketing departments for the Spanish market. Lots of the hotel chains which work with us are based here in Majorca and we consider this the perfect way in improving our relationship with hoteliers across Spain, he said.
The Balearic Economics Minister, Joaquin Garcia, was also at the opening and he said that the presence of trivago is further proof that Parc Bit is continuing to grow by attracting world leading companies to set up clusters and centres on the technology park which is good for the local economy and the creation of new jobs.
Trivago has already received 1'000 applicants from people wishing to work for them here in Palma.