ChinaTravelNews – Chinese outdoor specialist Toread will invest RMB230 million (approx: US$38 million) for 74.56% equity in OTA Eyoutour.
Eyoutour is an integrated travel O2O business that leverages a proprietary ETS system for rapid integration of upstream products with downstream retailers, and control product safety, efficiency and convenience of its travel product procurement and distribution platform. The platform has built up abundant resources such as travel product suppliers, top quality offline retailers and individual travel consultants. Its income has grown to a scale of RMB700 million as of 2014.
Eyoutour will use the raised funds to further develop and optimize its business model. It will further expand its pool of upstream suppliers via its wholly-owned subsidiary, Beautiful Scenery International Travel, while mobilizing individual service providers to optimize its travel consultant model.
After implementing its new model, Eyoutour will effectively scale up transactions on its platform. Its income is estimated to reach RMB6 billion in 2017.
Toread adopts a strategy of promoting a healthy lifestyle and making use of user data and consumer activity analysis obtained from its back-end system to rapidly build a user-centric business ecosystem of outdoor goods, adventure travel and sports .
Toread will leverage Eyoutour’s original travel platform system, supply chain and customer pool to accelerate more refined segmentation and develop travel products and services vertically. It will also consolidate Eyetours unique resources with its other acquisitions like Singapore-based Asiatravel, Lvye and Tripolers to expand its distribution and take a larger share in the travel market.(Translation by David)
