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Sabre makes offer to purchase Lastminute.com

Sabre Holdings Corp, the operator of Travelocity.com, agreed to acquire Lastminute.com for £577 million (US$1.08 billion) to become Europe's largest online travel service. Shares of Lastminute.com rose for a second day.

Southlake, Texas-based Sabre will pay 165 pence a share for the London-based company, according to a statement released yesterday.

Lastminute.com said on Wednesday that it had been approached, sending its shares up 45 percent to the highest in nine months. Yesterday's bid is 57 percent more than Tuesday's closing stock price.

"It's a pretty decent valuation, but if someone else came in it could go for up to 200 pence a share," said Tim Roberts, a fund manager at Cavendish Asset Management in London whose fund bought 120,000 Lastminute.com shares earlier this year. "This will shake out any other interested parties."

Sabre was one of three potential suitors named by analysts after Lastminute.com said it had received a takeover approach.

IAC/InterActiveCorp's Expedia, the world's largest Internet travel agency, or Cendant Corp, the industry's No. 2 operator, also may be interested in the business, according to Robin Chabbra, an analyst at Evolution Securities in London.

IAC spokeswoman Deborah Roth and Cendant spokesman Elliot Bloom yesterday declined to comment on Lastminute.com. Bloom reiterated that Cendant has "substantially completed our buildout in the online space" after December's US$404.3 million takeover of Ebookers Plc, Europe's largest Web travel agency.

"We can't rule in or out any potential other bids," Lastminute.com chairman Brian Collie said on a conference call yesterday.

"If anyone else wants to make a bid, they know the process they need to go through, and we will consider any such offers very carefully. There's nothing to prevent us recommending shareholders accepting a better offer if one materializes," he said.

Peter Smedley, an analyst at Bridgewell Securities in London, said he doesn't expect another offer for the business. He cut his rating on the stock to "sell" from "overweight."

Lastminute.com was founded in 1998 by Brent Hoberman, 36, and Martha Lane Fox, 32, who left at the end of 2003. The pair own more than 7 percent of the stock and stand to make £26 million and £13.5 million, respectively, from the takeover.
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