Google Acquires Frommer's Travel-Guide

Although Google said, for years, it is not interested in creating content, their thoughts may be different now.

On Monday, Google announced that it was acquiring Frommer’s travel publishing brand from John Wiley & Sons. They said that the acquisition is a bid to attract more advertising revenue with online-travel bookings and local-business information. According to a person in the discussion of the acquisition of the travel guide, Google paid $25 million for Former’s.

John Wiley & Sons said in a statement that they are selling off all of its travel publishing assets to Google. John Wiley & Sons also said that they are looking to sell its culinary, nautical and CliffNotes franchises also. The reports seem to align with the company’s SEC fillings saying that they are “exploring opportunities to sell a number of consumer print and digital publishing assets”, “as they no longer align with the company’s long-term strategies.” Upon the unload of Frommer’s travel-guide to Google, the company said that they will redirect the funds on their other assets and services like technical, scientific and medical publishing.

With the acquisition of Former’s travel-guide, Google is now able to show the data in their search results and the company could sell more travel-based ads and provide more tools for people to book travel arrangements. Alongside Google’s acquisition of Zagat in July 2010, Google is betting on the fact that they can become a trusted provider for travel and business information by aggregating data from both expert and customer data.

As of right now, the deal is not yet final, but it is expected to close soon. Google has not yet commented on any more information on the deal.