Publish Date : 06-Aug-2018
Bix, Inc. a leading international supplier of On-Demand software and E-commerce services to the insurance, financial, healthcare and e-learning industries, today announced that one of its Indian subsidiaries has signed agreements to acquire Mumbai based Mercury Travels and Delhi based Leisure Corp for a cumulative amount of approximately $14.2 million, with the goal of creating a new Travel Division to focus on a niche segment of the travel market.
The new Travel Exchange named Mercury - An EbixCash Luxury initiative, will focus on the luxury, events and sports related traveler and will be led by the Leisure Corp Founder Naveen Kundu. The Mercury Exchange will have the following three tightly integrated components
Mercury Travels entire corporate, leisure & adventure related travel business with the exception of its Forex business
Leisure Corps entire sports and events related travel business (MICE)
Via.coms events based travel business (MICE)
Mr. Naveen Kundu will hold 15% shareholding in this new Mercury initiative, while Ebix will have a controlling 85% share in the venture. Mercurys Forex business will be integrated into EbixCashs existing CDL Forex exchange business.
The acquisition of Mercury and Leisure Corp will increase the employee strength of Ebix in India by around 400 employees to approximately 7,600 employees. With the creation of this new luxury Mercury Division, Ebix will now have two brands in travel focused on different niche audiences Via and Mercury.
Ebix believes that the Mercury business initiative can continue to grow at the rate of 20% or more annually with operating margins of 30% or more, once fully integrated. Ebix expects the acquisition to be immediately accretive to its earnings and forecasts 9 cents in increased Diluted EPS, once the acquisitions are fully integrated over the next 6 months. Ebix funded the acquisition using its internal cash reserves and did not use any investment bankers for the transaction.
Incorporated in 1948 as an Oberoi Hotel Group Company, Mercury is a popular luxury travel brand with a pan India Network of 40 Preferred Sales Agents (PSAs), 20 Branch offices across 16 major cities in India, 350 employees, and an Extended reach in international markets through marketing offices in London, Hamburg & Frankfurt. Amongst other travel related services like Events based travel and insurance, Mercury also has a Foreign Exchange business serviced through its AD-II license issued by the Reserve Bank of India.
The Company is also seen as a leader in the adventure space, with specialization in organizing adventure safaris, sea water rafting and Himalayan expeditions. The Company also owns an adventure hotel property through its Mercury Himalaya Expo joint venture.
Mercury has multi-year contracts and associations with airlines, bus operators, hotels etc. besides having a client base that includes leading names like the Oberoi Hotels chain and the Mahendra Group. Mercury also has 54 franchisee partnerships for undertaking money-changing activities, with leading hotels like Hyatt, Oberoi, Imperial etc.
Incorporated in 1997, Leisure Corp today is one of Indias leading players in the Events related travel space (MICE) & Luxury Trains and Luxury travel, with a focus on the insurance and financial sector & incoming Luxury travelers. The Companys core competency is to provide a customized range of services from conceptualization, design, budgeting, planning to execution of large corporate meetings and conferences, involving thousands of attendees. The Company also specializes in creating tailor-made packages for the sports travelers, with exclusive travel agent rights from India for premier world sports events like the recent FIFA Football World Cup in Russia and the 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup in London. Leisure Corp has exclusive tie up with Luxury Train travel in India with Palace on Wheels, Maharajas Express and Golden Chariott. It is poised to become the market leader in Luxury inbound train travel by 2020.
Leisure Corp has an impressive client base spread across the insurance and Finance sector in India, including Companies like ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, Yes Bank, HDFC Bank, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, Max Life, ICICI Assets Management, GE and Honda etc. The Company has a rich history of partnerships with many renowned hotel chains like Four Seasons, Ritz Carlton, W Hotels and the Leading hotels & Resorts of the World.
Ebix intends to consolidate these two acquisitions into its Financial Exchange - EbixCash while bringing significant synergies and redundancies to the combined operation. The acquisition of the Omni-channel Business, would further strengthen Ebixs position in the Financial Exchange market in India, as travel transactions can be one of the key areas of any leading financial exchange, with an estimated user base of 600 million in India alone.
I am excited to join the Ebix family and lead EbixCashs new Mercury initiative. With affluence and an upper middle class continuing to grow in India, it is time to have a travel exchange that can provide high standards of service and luxury like never before to this section of the society. Naveen Kundu, Founder and Managing Director of Leisure Corp said. I have spent my career conceptualizing and implementing creative event based travel programs for the corporates, sports enthusiasts and the adventure travelers. We will now try to blend that expertise and niche focus, with our focus on luxury and creating new white labeled travel properties.
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