Chinese giant snaps up UK travel website Skyscanner for £1.4bn

UK travel website Skyscanner is being snapped up by China's Ctrip.com in a £1.4bn deal.

It marks the latest swoop by a Chinese company for a British firm.

Edinburgh-based Skyscanner, launched in 2003, allows users to compare prices from travel sites when searching for flights, hotels and rental cars.

It is now available in more than 30 languages and has about 60 million monthly users.

The company employs more than 800 staff with 10 offices worldwide including in Barcelona, Beijing, Budapest, Glasgow and London.

Ctrip.com, which is China's biggest online travel service, said the management of Skyscanner would remain in place and run the company independently.

Skyscanner chief executive and co-founder Gareth Williams said the deal took his firm "one step closer to our goal of making travel search as simple as possible for travellers around the world".

Ctrip expects to complete the takeover by the end of the year.

Jamie Coleman, the co-founder & Chairman of Codebase, the UK's largest 'incubator' for start-up tech companies, told Sky News that Scotland was becoming a major player in the digital economy.

"In Scotland, we've got the brainpower here and we've got this history of building big hard stuff and I see that moving from the engineering world of steam engines and bridges to, now, the internet.

"We're interested in growing those companies that will be major employers for the country. Edinburgh is one of the most significant places - we've got more 'Unicorns' (tech companies valued at more than $1bn) now per head of population than anywhere else in Europe.

That ability to take great brainpower to build those companies in a town where people want to live is huge."

Chinese companies have an increasing foothold in the UK, with department store House of Fraser bought by Sanpower in 2014.

Meanwhile, last year the Fosun conglomerate bought a stake in travel operator Thomas Cook (Frankfurt: A0MR3W - news) .

Elsewhere, China is a major investor in the new nuclear plant to be built at Hinkley Point, while Chinese investors are reportedly among those eyeing a majority stake in National Grid (LSE: NG.L - news) 's gas distribution network.

In the tech sector, Oscar-winning UK visual effects company Framestore - behind Gravity and the Harry Potter films - was sold earlier this month to China's Cultural Investment Holdings in a deal valuing it at £150m.

China's second largest property developer, Evergrande (HKSE: 3333-OL.HK - news) , is in talks to buy British house builder Cala (Other OTC: CCAA - news) .