Expedia Inc has acquired Auto Escape Group. This move boosts the American online travel agency giant’s presence in the European car rental market.
Auto Escape Group’s portfolio includes autoescape.fr, which claims to be France’s most used car hire brand and to have thousands of offices worldwide.
Annual business turnover for Auto Escape was estimated at 120 million euros — a fivefold jump in five years — according to sources quoted by Les Echos.
Auto Escape says most of its revenue now comes from outside of France. Its 20 websites also includes large German brand Car Del Mar.
The 15-year-old group says that it has brand-wide access to the fleets of nearly 300 rental car chains, such as Ada and Hertz, in more than 125 countries.
Until now, the group had been owned by French private equity firm Montefiore plus some of the group’s executives. Terms were not disclosed.
