Skyscanner, a leading travel metasearch site is being acquired by Ctrip, a Chinese company for $1.74 billion.

Skyscanner is free to use and searches hundreds of other sites to find the best deals on airfares. They also do hotel and car rental searches.

Skift mentions how Skyscanner “had been rumored to be seeking to do an initial public offering“.  The IPO won’t be happening now due to the site being bought by Ctrip. (Skift writes that Ctrip is the second largest OTA (online travel agency) in the world.

Ctrip bought out Skyscanner’s majority shareholder and plans to offer to buy out the remaining shareholders.

The Skyscanner site debuted in 2003 and is based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Over 50 million people use the site each month. Besides having the website, there is also an app which has been downloaded over 50 million times.

I wonder what kind of impact Ctrip’s purchase of Skyscanner might have on the travel industry. Skift wrote that Ctrip’s new CEO, Jane Jie Sun said “that the acquisition would strengthen Ctrip’s overseas air ticketing capabilities“.

What site do you use most frequently to search for your travel bookings?

Find out more from Skift here.