Ebates Cartera Purchase
We have seen consolidation in the hotel industry and we have seen consolidation in the airline industry. Now, those of us who love shopping portals are about to see even more consolidation. Cartera, who runs the Splender portal along with most of the major airline and credit card portals, has been purchased by Ebates.
With the purchase of Cartera, Rakuten who owns Ebates now has a significant portion of the shopping portal industry under their control. For those who don’t know, Rakuten is a huge company. They own Buy.com and are one of the two biggest companies in the affiliate marketing space. This deal is YUGE.
According to the press release, “Cartera works with 5 of the top 10 U.S. credit card issuers and 5 of the 6 largest U.S. airlines, and since its inception, has given away more than 20 billion points and miles.” Among the portals Cartera runs are: AAdvantage Shopping, SkyMiles Shopping, Rapid Rewards Shopping and MileagePlus Shopping among others.
This buyout certainly means that we may see a change to how these portals are run in the long term, however I wouldn’t expect any changes to come soon. Hopefully we will see more of the bonuses they have been running lately, but only time will tell.
You can find the full press release and details here.
Your Thoughts?
What are your thoughts? Will this hurt consumers or will Cartera’s partners keep pressure on them to stay competitive?
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Meh. I’d rather have more competition in this space.