The Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC) ITHAX, of Greek and Cypriot interests, has announced its merger agreement with Mondee, a technology organization and Tourism Industry Disruptor, based in Silicon Valley, thus introducing its shares in the NASDAQ market, with a total market capitalization of 1 billion dollars.
Orestes Fintiklis, founder of Ithaca Capital Partners (a Private Equity company specializing in tourism and real estate based in Miami), together with the founders of AXIA Ventures Group Dimitris Athanasopoulos, Antonis Achilleoudis and George Linatsas and their partner Alexandros Argyros have founded, on Wall Street, a Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC) ITHAX.
In February 2021, ITHAX raised 241.5 million dollars with an IPO, listing its shares on the NASDAQ Stock Exchange. 50 million dollars through PIPE (Private Investment in Public Equity) have been added to the previous funds, that gave the opportunity to participate in the venture, among others to funds of Morgan Stanley Investment Management, Origami and ARCPE as well as companies in the tourism sector (Travco, Investment Benefits) and founders of large private equity investment houses from America and Europe.
The sole purpose of all Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (SPAC) is to merge with a non-listed company which, using the reverse merger method, imports its shares on the US stock exchange.
The agreement and Mondee
ITHAX agreed with Mondee, a state-of-the-art company that specializes in B2B services in the tourism industry, and immediately after the “reverse merger” method the shares of the new consolidated company with a market capitalization of 1 billion dollars will be traded on the NASDAQ codenamed “MOND“.
Mondee was founded in 2011 in the U.S.A. introducing new technologies and disrupting the market of travel agents, mainly in the leisure sector, which until then “abstained” from important innovations. Soon, the company became a leader in the field of private air ticket purchases in North America. Today Mondee is expanding into the hotel sector, as well as the car rental, cruise and package holiday rental sector. All this, based on the state-of-the-art technologies and the extensive network it has developed.
“Mondee developed technologies that changed the industry and transformed antiquated travel infrastructure, offering a modern flexible platform.Mondee’s technology platform and its relationships with the tourism industry, offer the right platform (marketplace), the right tools and the right content that facilitate and accelerate the success of our customers. This announcement marks the beginning of the next chapter of our growth as the travel market continues to normalize.Mondee’s vision is to transform the entire travel industry, as it already provides “travel solutions in one box” services, with an extensive network of travel agents and autonomous employees (gig-economy workers), corporate customers and closed groups offering them easy and automatic interconnection with airlines, hotels as well as additional tourist services.The next step in Mondee’s evolution is to continue expanding its content offering, enhancing hotel options in the vacation rental sector and digitizing cruise and tour segments, while further strengthening its distribution channels.We are excited to partner with the ITHAX team as we try to accelerate our growth in existing channels as well as in new departments, both organically and through mergers and acquisitions.”, said Prasad Gundumogula, Founder and CEO of Mondee, after the agreement was announced.
“ITHAX started with a mission to work with an established leader in travel and hospitality that implements an extremely subversive, but proven correct business model and has to show exponential revenue growth and historical EBITDA.
Mondee has created a new subversive online “marketplace” of travel content in a market of about 1 trillion dollars that generates a significant increase in turnover in a fragmented, huge market.
Prasad and his team have proven their ability to perform successful and collaborative acquisitions, while Mondee’s multifaceted growth strategy allows it to continue to capitalize on market trends.
We are excited to have the opportunity to work with Prasad and his experienced team to help bring the company to the stock market in an exciting valuation, which we believe will allow investors to reap much of the rise from Mondee’s exponential growth.”, stated Orestes Fintiklis, President and CEO of ITHAX and Founder of Ithaca Capital Partners, which specializes in investments in the tourism and hotel industry.