dartland

This is like saying no American ever takes a risk because there is unemployment benefits, free healthcare clinics, and homeless shelters.

In Jason's case, remember, shit did hit the fan and he couldn't pay his debt. Instead of running to his parents (or bankruptcy, for that matter) he scrounged for some consulting gigs and short-time jobs to pay it back.

Frankly, that part of the story is among the most inspiring, since in the middle of that, we started FlightCaster.

Great post! I came from consulting into start-up world also (although I'm non-technical) and while you definitely have to re-learn many things to adjust to building a company, there are many many valuable lessons from working in that environment that entrepreneurs are all too quick to dismiss.

But the bottom line of your post is definitely the right summary: Do what feels right when it feels right, and you'll be fine. You can't lose when you're choosing between multiple interesting options. And as soon as your current path becomes uninteresting, look elsewhere.

Thanks for posting.

Kayak is a great company and this is a fascinating time to be in travel search. Go for it! A first job under Paul English (even a few layers beneath him) is a big win and Kayak's engineering reputation so great that you'll have plenty of opportunities down the road.

So in summary: Worst scenario is pretty darn good for you!

While your thesis may be correct, some of your assumptions are a bit off:

1) Bing has stopped investing in travel tech, they now use Kayak for search. So do we still believe in the value prop?

2) Farecast (fare predictor) turns out to be not very valuable. So much so, that Bing couldn't even sustain development of their own search tool. Can Google do a better job of it? Maybe. Can they do a good enough job of if that it's ROI positive? I'm skeptical.

I agree that Google believes many of your assertions. I don't agree that this makes it true. Do people really need more sophisticated travel search functionality? Sure, you can imagine lots of cool stuff -- bells and whistles. But ask Kayak if their "Explore" feature (perhaps a lite version of what you can imagine Google doing with ITA) drives their business? I'd argue it's neat, good for branding and loyalty, but not at the end of the day, a major source of value.

That being said -- the key thesis of: Google trying to hold onto relevance in travel search -- is true. However, they are still pretty much a one-horse show (search revenue), and travel is one of (if not the) biggest vertical today.

Exactly.

Yes and No.

I want to agree with you (and I think the hype is usually way more than the actual change), but Southwest is almost 40 years old and they've never made an acquisition of this size nor have they ever before had another type of plane in their fleet.

I think they want you to believe this is plain vanilla M&A growth to get access to ATL and the east coast, but in reality, it will be the biggest challenge they've ever faced to integrate AirTran (fun to watch!).

That being said, I bet they wished AirTran was an all 737 airline. But they just don't have a choice, they can't retire 86 717s on the spot -- they'll be forced to fly them for at least several years.

True, but if you analyze Southwest's network, it's way more hub and spoke than most people think. They are the largest carrier at many of their top airports, and a high percentage of their flights go through one of those top hubs.

Sure, it's not like AirTran at ATL, but I think you'll find an ATL hub not nearly as inconsistent with Southwest's current network than at first glance.

Very true, although most companies that have corporate contracts do so for multiple major airlines, so there still is choice. Also, corporate contracts have much more influence for international travel, they aren't nearly as meaningful for domestic travel.

Yes and no. Price is relative to demand. If the plane fills up ahead of expected, demand is assumed to be higher and prices will go up. If the plane is more empty than predicted, fares will fall. Competitor moves can also impact this.

But even aside from that, prices go up as the cheaper fare classes get sold out. This isn't the airline raising fares, it is simply the cheap seats get sold out.

Finally, there are fare rules. The cheapest fares generally have 14 or 7 day advanced purchase requirements. So without touching anything, fares will go up at those time increments as the cheapest fares are no longer available, even if seats are still available. This is to protect the airline from selling cheap seats to last-minute business travelers with a high willingness to pay.

4 hours out, airlines notify users of ~4% of flights that will eventually be delayed 1+ hours.

FlightCaster right now captures 40% of those flights 4 hours out (and growing as the algorithm is improved).

That is the origination of the statistic.