Squire Sanders advises Travel Technology Investments Limited (owner of Travel Republic) on its sale to Dubai based dnata World Travel
5 January 2012
Squire Sanders has advised longstanding client Travel Technology Investments Limited and its founders Kane Pirie, Chris Waite and Paul Furner on the sale of the entire issued share capital of the company to dnata World Travel Limited.
Travel Technology Investments Limited is the holding company of Travel Republic Limited which operates the leading online travel agent www.travelrepublic.co.uk. Since 2003 Travel Republic has emerged as the UK’s largest privately owned online travel agency and one of Europe’s biggest travel companies, able to provide competitive deals on travel, hotels and hundreds of flights around the world.
dnata World Travel Limited is a newly incorporated company in England owned by dnata World Travel, a travel agency based in Dubai. As part of the sale to dnata World Travel, the Travel Republic management have subscribed for a 25% stake in the purchasing vehicle.
Kane Pirie, Managing Director of Travel Republic, commented: “We are pleased to join the dnata Group and excited about the considerable opportunities to intensify growth in the UK, Europe and beyond. The transaction is the culmination of years of painstaking work and is very important to us. Travel Republic is our baby. We had confidence in Squire Sanders to deliver and cannot praise them highly enough.”
Squire Sanders Corporate partner Tim Hewens said: “Travel Republic is a great success story led by a dynamic and innovative management team – it is fast becoming Europe’s online travel agent of choice. We have worked closely with the company and the founders over a number of years and have been delighted to see the business go from strength to strength. They have concluded a great deal with dnata and we wish them continued success.”
The Squire Sanders team was led by Tim Hewens and involved specialists from across the firm, Alastair Lowry, Melinda Willis, Jonathan Rogers and Tim Stead in Corporate, Tim Jarvis and Peter Morley in Tax, Jan Lucas and Miriam Lampert in Labour & Employment, Mike Shaw in Property, Alastair Purssell in Commercial and IP, Samrad Nazer and Anthony Stanford in Banking and Kris Weber in Pensions.