Kayak Isn’t Worried About Google: CEO
Any company in the Internet space worries about Google, but it hasn’t had an impact on Kayak’sbusiness, the company’s co-founder and CEO, Steve Hafner, said in a CNBC interview.
In addition to competing with the online travel sites like Expedia, Orbitz Worldwide, and Priceline.com, Kayak has been competing with Internet giant Google since inception.
But Kayak isn’t feeling any pressure, Hafner said. (Read More: Kayak’s Profits Rise as Revenue Jumps 36%.)
“Google has had their flight search and hotel finder out in the market for two years,” he told CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street,”but “it’s an inferior product. We haven’t seen any impact on our business.”
While it competes with Google , about a tenth of queries do come from Google searches and Hafner said Kayak is happy to have as many queries coming through Google as possible. He’s confident that once people use Kayak, they’ll continue to come back.
“Our biggest barrier to growth right now is consumer habit and awareness,” Hafner said. “You need to spend aggressively in marketing to get there.”
Since going public in July, the stock is up over 20 percent. “If we stay focused on executing our vision, the stock price will take care of itself,” Hafner said.
