Tui in ‘no hurry’ to decide on future of non-mainstream businesses

Earlier this week, the tour operator announced plans to integrate its mainstream division and revealed plans to sell off hotel booking platform LateRooms.com.

The status of the rest of the company’s assets such, which include operators such as Sovereign and Exodus as well as B2B businesses such as bedsonline, is more unclear with many speculating that Tui would look to sell them off.

However, Peter Long stressed that divisions remained part of Tui’s plans and that the company was in “no hurry to do anything”.

“We see… Hotelbeds as a clear global market leader in a segment that we find very attractive and we’re going to continue to build and invest to ensure that business continues to grow at the levels that we’ve seen over the last few years,” he said.

“We see this as a very attractive business and under our ownership is where it lies today and at this point we are saying no different.”

Tui Travel’s former chief financial officer Will Waggott is now chief executive of the non-mainstream division, and Long said the new management team would be looking into improving the performance of some of the specialist businesses.

“Again they are separate from our integrated tour business but that doesn’t mean that because they’re separate we don’t like them and we don’t wish to keep them.”