Date published: 01.09.08 - not release date

WAYN partners up with Kayak, the world's largest travel search site

WAYN (Where Are You Now), the world’s largest travel and lifestyle online community, has just announced a strategic partnership with travel search aggregator Kayak to offer a comprehensive flight search service for their 8 million members.

Kayak will provide the technology for the new flight search service on the WAYN website, enabling users to change their travel search parameters and see the updated results instantly. As one of the 1st travel sites to use AJAX technology, WAYN users will benefit from 100's of flight options to search from with all available price and itinerary combinations, as well as results displayed according to relevancy. Kayak.com is especially helpful because it links travellers directly to the airlines to make their purchase, which means users avoid paying the high service fees charged by online agencies and benefit from incentives offered on supplier sites such as reward points and upgrades.

Providing a flight search service to WAYN members is a logical step in a key strategic move to combine social networking with travel services. The move will also support WAYN’s aim to increase travel services and overall value on their site by integrating the project alongside other new trip-planning services currently under development. Jerome Touze, co-founder, comments:

“We want to entice our users to add their trips, and all other relevant content that will be useful in a travel context such as travel photos, reviews and ratings, blogs, travel journals, videos and so on. But as part of this customer experience, we also want to provide them with the relevant tools to plan their actual trips. Flight search will be one of the steps that will help us achieve this goal."

With a recent Series A funding of $11m through Venture Capitalist ECP, there's a strong team propelling the future of www.wayn.com. Brent Hoberman, former founder and Chief Executive Officer of lastminute.com, travel experts such as David Soskin and Hugo Burge from Cheapflights, as well as Andrew Critchlow and Andy Phillips from Active Hotels, are also on board.

The new flight search function will initially be launched as a beta service and will see a number of releases over time as WAYN collects user feedback and improves the functionalities.

Working in partnership with Kayak will be a key move in diversifying revenue streams for both businesses; and through Kayak's integrated flight search service WAYN users will be able to search for the best fares online, regardless of where they're based.

About WAYN:

WAYN offers a vibrant community by which users can keep in contact with people they meet all over the world, make new friends based on where they plan to go, and keep everyone back home informed of their whereabouts and adventures. Users are able to create a profile, log their past, present and future trips, and to locate other members based on location.
Top services on WAYN.com apart from its global online forum, are photo storage, mailbox options, instant messenger, a travel guide, chatboards, and worldwide SMS.

WAYN's integration of Kayak's new flight search function will add overall value to the WAYN site through a resourceful combination of social networking and travel services. WAYN currently reaches over 8 million members in over 220 countries.

About Kayak.com

Kayak.com, the world’s largest travel site, displays results from 404 travel sites, providing prices and itineraries for 100's of airlines, more than 155,000 hotels, all leading rental car companies and 17 cruise lines. Kayak.com has been named “Best of the Web” by BusinessWeek, “Best of the Web” by Forbes.com, “50 Coolest Websites” by TIME Magazine, “Best Travel Search Engine” by the Associated Press, “Best Search Aid” by Travel + Leisure Magazine and “Best of the Web” by US News & World Report. Launched in 2005 by co-founders of Orbitz, Travelocity and Expedia, Kayak.com’s investors include General Catalyst Partners, Sequoia Capital, America Online, Inc and Accel Partners. For more info, visit www.Kayak.com.

WAYN PR Contact:

Jerome Touze
WAYN.com
Where Are You Now Ltd
123 Aldersgate Street – Floor 3
London EC1A 4JQ
0207 336 8027
Jerome@wayn.com
http://www.wayn.com