Expedia, the US-based internet travel website, and Renren, the top real-name social network in China, jointly announced that Renren sold eLong, their online travel planning and hotel booking, and flight booking site to Expedia for $72.4 million or $23 per ADS.

“We’re pleased to have an opportunity to increase our investment in eLong as we see China as a key market in our efforts to expand internationally,” said Dara Khosrowshahi, President and Chief Executive Officer of Expedia. “We have been very happy with the strategic and operational progress made by eLong and look forward to many more years of success.”

“Our early investment in eLong helped us build mutually beneficial commercial ties as well as generate strong returns for our shareholders. Renren and eLong will continue to work on a number of joint initiatives, including Nuomi hotel group-buy, one of the largest hotel group-buy sites in China. We will continue this strong relationship with eLong and deliver more popular products together moving forward,” commented Joseph Chen, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Renren.

Just last week, eLong reported a very positive Q3 net income, which is up fivefold from last year to RMB9.4 million (US$1.5 million) on 19 percent higher revenue of RMB164.3 million (US$25.8 million).

“Renren will continue to be a valued business partner to us, and we look forward to future cooperation with Renren,” said Guangfu Cui, eLong’s Chief Executive Officer.

In addition, Expedia’s advertising sales division, Expedia Media Solutions, announced that by the end of the month, they will begin beta testing a social integration opportunity that allows partners to enhance existing advertising campaigns with social media elements.  The idea was based on customer feedback they acquired from FriendTrips Facebook campaign earlier this year, which increased Expedia’s fanbase by 770%, from 130,000 to more than 1 million.

The beta testing phase will be offered to select Expedia partners and the testing phase will run through until December of this year and the service will be officially offered by 2012.

The program offers two ways for partners to enhance their Expedia.com-based campaign sites:

• By bringing page “liking” capabilities onto their Expedia.com landing pages, partners can expand their own Facebook fan base.
• Content published to a partner’s Facebook Page can be brought onto the Expedia.com landing page so customers are drawn deeper into the interaction with their page.