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News You Could Do Without

by Mike Masnick

Thu, Jun 29th 2000 2:28am





Competition for Priceline

from the the-airlines-team-up dept

A group of the major airlines have teamed up to invest in a new startup that will compete with Priceline. It won't be a name-your-own-price deal, but rather will sell specifically discounted tickets for "leftover" seats. This way they will compete directly with Priceline, but without infringing on their patents. A couple of things I wonder about: is it questionable that so many of the major airlines are backing this? Is that collusion in any way? Second, why not just find the best price on this new site, and then go a little cheaper on Priceline to get a better deal?

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  1.  

    Purple Demon (HotWire) vs. Priceline

    identicon
    Clouser, Jun 29th, 2000 @ 5:20pm

    This new "startup" is a shame. It's really a concoction of Scient's; like the investment banks, these new web "consulting" or "outsourcing" firms (that Forrester blasted) put together "pitches" aimed at bricks and mortar companies. Basically, the airlines were blinded and hard sold into this deal. Oh, and let's not forget the poor investor. It was quite telling that an outside investor w/ little experienced was aroused into this deal. Scient walks away with a big fat check so its old-boy, nonrisk-taking MBA's can have yet another fattening yuppie restaurant meal in one of the finer establishments. Scient's partners benefit as well. The airlines are left with a big potential lawsuit and little competitive advantage. The investor ends up with a negative IRR. The consumer pays more for his already value-taken away seat on the airplane. The entrepreneur suffers. Entrepreneurship loses one to the big cheeses of the world. This is the worst fallout of this quirky, illogical, burgouise deal. Mike Clouser [email protected] www.iLodging.com

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]


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