Unister

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Unister Holding GmbH iL

logo
legal form GmbH
founding July 2002 (as Unister GmbH)
resolution 2016
Reason for dissolution insolvency
Seat Leipzig , Germany
management Thomas Wagner
Number of employees 1670 (2012)
sales 307 million (2011)
Branch E-business
Website www.unister.de

The Unister Holding GmbH , in short Unister was a German company with headquarters in Leipzig , the web portals powered and marketed. The company is in liquidation .

overview

Unister was founded in July 2002 by the Leipzig business administration student Thomas Wagner , who was one of the managing directors with interruptions until his death in 2016. In October 2002 a student exchange platform, unister-netz.de, went online at the address unister.de. Since then, the number of its own websites has increased to over 40, partly through start-ups, partly through acquisitions. The company is primarily active in the travel, finance, automotive, media, real estate and social media businesses. To make the site known, Unister bought advertising space on Google and shot testimonials for television with Michael Ballack and Reiner Calmund . In retrospect, Heinz-Roger Dohms assessed the use of advertising on tagesschau.de as follows: "Ultimately, two people in particular benefited from the supposed 'Unister success story': Google and the television stations."

In February 2008 Unister Media GmbH was founded, which specializes in the marketing of online portals. The company also founded a market research company UMA Unister Market Research & Analysis .

The company, based in Leipzig, had around 1670 employees in 2010 and had branches in Berlin, Hamburg, Düsseldorf, Dresden, Stralsund, Magdeburg, Jena and Chemnitz. In the 2010 financial year, Unister Holding achieved sales of around 227 million euros and a loss of around two million euros. Unister was one of the largest German independent Internet companies and recorded more than 10 million page users per month ( unique users ) according to the online research group . The main shareholder at Unister was Thomas Wagner until his death.

In July 2015, Unister announced the cut of a total of 250 jobs. In 2014, 200 employees had already been laid off.

The insurance brokerage portal geld.de was sold to the JDC Group in May 2016 . A purchase option announced in July 2015 by the HanseMerkur insurance group did not come into effect.

On July 14, 2016, managing director Thomas Wagner and co-partner Oliver Schilling died in a plane crash near Ajdovščina in Slovenia.

On July 18, 2016, Unister filed for bankruptcy . The following day, the insolvency administrator Lucas F. Flöther announced that the Urlaubstours subsidiary had also filed for bankruptcy. The customer bookings made with the tour operator are covered by insurance. According to the insolvency administrator Lucas F. Flöther, Unister is to be sold to investors as a whole. By July 21, 2016, three other Unister subsidiaries filed for bankruptcy, Unister Travel Betriebsgesellschaft, U-Deals and Unister GmbH. In the course of the bankruptcies up to the end of July, which, in addition to the holding company, have registered 12 subsidiaries, around 900 of the 1000 employees have been affected to date.

In August 2016 it became known that two right-wing extremists, Reinhard Rade and Hans Jörg Schimanek , were doing controversial business with the company. At the beginning of September 2016, the company's subsidiary ab-in-den-Urlaub Betriebsgesellschaft mbH also filed for insolvency.

history

Up until 2011, the company generated a large part of its surplus through Google arbitrage : its own adverts brought in more income than the costs of adverts placed on Google. In 2011, Google banned this practice. From then on, legally incompatible additional products were created to compensate for the loss of income. Public prosecutors have been investigating these additional products.

The company was one of the largest German e-commerce providers. Unister developed and marketed internet portals. Among other things, it was active in the travel market and in the brokering of insurance and loans, whereby there was criticism with regard to consumer friendliness and the way it dealt with competitors.

A Unister spokesman said in February 2012 after criticism from the consumer center in Saxony on the fluege.de portal that one should “take a closer look before booking”. The background was the complaints from consumers who canceled a booking, for example because they did not want to use one of the payment methods offered by Unister, and were then warned by the company to pay the full travel price.

The Federal Court of Justice had already sentenced Unister in 2011 to implement an EU directive and thus confirmed a lower court judgment. According to this guideline, the respective final price for flight bookings must be shown in good time in a transparent manner. A final price indication only at the end of the booking is to be prevented. Unister had refused to implement these provisions as part of a voluntary commitment in the travel industry. In the case of the booking processes criticized, additional services were already pre-set into the booker's selected travel package until at least summer 2012. The interested party was therefore urged to recognize additional services as such and to deselect them before the final booking.

Unister announced on July 10, 2012 that these default settings, especially in the area of travel cancellation insurance , have now been terminated. The Unister spokesman described the complaints of the consumer advice center as common practice in the industry; Fluege.de acts no differently than other major booking portals. The opt-out function (you have to deselect insurance) is available on many large portals.

In addition, Unister had a seal from the VBS Consumer Protection Association. V. (verbraucherschutz.de) received; However, on July 3, 2012 , the Dresden Higher Regional Court prohibited its use on the fluege.de website under threat of a fine of up to 250,000 euros. Consumers get the impression that this association is an independent inspection body. In fact, he sells services to companies; the association has nothing to do with the consumer advice centers.

In September 2011, some senior employees, especially from the tourism sector, left Unister. The Wirtschaftswoche suspected behind some moral reasons; Unister has a dubious reputation in the travel industry.

In July 2012 the magazine Computer Bild published an extensive article about the methods of the Unister group. Unister responded with a declaration of cease and desist and obligation under penalty of punishment and accused the magazine of incorrect factual assertions. The courts agreed with Unister on a number of points, but Computer-Bild stuck to its presentation on most points. Unister had (as of April 2013) warned bloggers who refer to the relevant critical reporting.

In December 2012, Unister founder Thomas Wagner gave an interview to the FAZ . He answered the question why, even after ten years on the market, Unister repeatedly gave the impression that it was “not up to date”, that “in the past, many projects had been set up in parallel. Of course there are also mistakes. We learn from it and are constantly improving. "

Controversy over new company headquarters

Unister planned the construction of a new company headquarters in downtown Leipzig; the building permit was available from September 2011. This was preceded by extensive public discussions in which numerous media were involved, including the ZDF broadcasts WISO and Volle Kanne . The point of contention was an additional floor, which was not taken into account in the 2009 design. According to the city's original position, the new Unister building would tower above the other buildings; In an interview with the Leipziger Volkszeitung , managing director Thomas Wagner criticized Lord Mayor Burkhard Jung and the building mayor Martin zur Nedden.

Then it was considered to move the seat; Magdeburg and Schweinfurt applied as possible locations. In March 2010, the media reported an agreement in the dispute over the new building. Accordingly, a draft was presented that was accepted by both sides. According to zur Nedden, "nothing stands in the way of processing a swift building permit". For example, the Immobilien Zeitung wrote in March 2010 about the compromise that was emerging between Unister and the city of Leipzig: “Public scolding helps”.

In addition to the height, other problems arose in the approval process. For example, the Leipziger Volkszeitung reported that the nine-storey rear wall of the planned Unister building would “impair the working and living conditions in the rooms behind the windows”. Unister objected that the affected rooms had been empty for years and that, according to building files from the 1970s, they had been built into a fire wall that Unister had acquired. "We are assuming that Mayor Jung personally and the upper city officials will keep their word and that Unister will be granted the building permit in the future," said a Unister spokesman.

In May 2011, Unister started negotiations with several general contractors to start the construction work. The schedule was based on the start of construction in autumn 2012. The new building should be erected within 24 months and offer space for 1,400 employees.

In December 2015, Unister announced that it would not build a new company headquarters. The building plot was sold.

Investigations

Investigators from the State Office of Criminal Investigation in Saxony searched the Unister headquarters in Leipzig on December 11, 2012. According to the authority, employees of the Integrated Investigation Unit Saxony (INES) confiscated computers and files. Two managers of the fluege.de portal were temporarily taken into custody for about a week. Another company manager was arrested three days later.

In 2012, the Dresden public prosecutor accused Unister of having sold insurance products via its online portals without permission, which resulted in tax losses of around one million euros because the insurance tax had not been paid. The tour operator TUI then terminated the agency contract with Unister without notice . Unister managing director Thomas Wagner said in an interview with the FAZ on December 21, 2012: “We have a decision from 2002 from the then Federal Insurance Supervisory Office, from which [...] it emerges that the cancellation protection is not an insurance business requiring approval and therefore there is also no insurance tax to be paid. As a result, this cancellation protection was offered on our portal for ten years up to the day of the raid for travel bookings. [...] Therefore, we absolutely cannot understand the drastic action taken by the authorities in Saxony [...]. "

There is also the suspicion that in 2010 and 2011, partnersuche.de could have automatically faked contact requests with invented profiles and thus lured customers into subscriptions.

In 2013 Unister announced that Peter Zimmermann would become managing director from September. He has been government spokesman in Thuringia since 2009 under Prime Minister Christine Lieberknecht , who has now put him into temporary retirement. As a result, Zimmermann would continue to receive benefits from the state in addition to his future salary.

In March 2016, the Leipzig Regional Court admitted parts of the indictment for the main proceedings against three people close to Unister. Other parts, in particular the allegation of computer fraud , were rejected. Meanwhile, it became known that the financial supervisory authority BaFin had drawn up a hearing letter for Unister in 2012. In it, the Bafin assessed Unister's business practices as unlawful. At the request of the Dresden Public Prosecutor's Office, the letter was not sent “so as not to endanger the investigation”. “It would be a legal scandal,” said Leipzig law professor Marc Desens of the Leipziger Volkszeitung. At the same time, the Dresden Public Prosecutor's Office brought a new charge against four people in which it was about computer fraud and tax evasion. The opening decision had not yet been made at the end of March 2016.

insolvency

On July 18, 2016, Unister filed for bankruptcy . The following day, the insolvency administrator Lucas F. Flöther announced that the Urlaubstours subsidiary had also filed for bankruptcy. The customer bookings made with the tour operator are covered by insurance. According to the insolvency administrator Lucas F. Flöther, Unister is to be sold to investors as a whole. By July 21, 2016, three other Unister subsidiaries filed for bankruptcy, Unister Travel Betriebsgesellschaft, U-Deals and Unister GmbH. In the course of the bankruptcies, around 900 of the remaining 1,000 employees have been affected to date. The company is said to have about 10 million euros in debt to Google. Unister received loans of around 34 million euros from the Hamburg insurer HanseMerkur . There is a suspicion that bankruptcy has been delayed. Originally, bankruptcy should be filed in April. An attempt should be made to sell the company by the end of September. Because of the bankruptcy, in September 2016 the state of Saxony demanded 1.4 million euros in funding for projects that had not yet been completed.

Investors

Before his death, Thomas Wagner tried to save his company and contacted investors. To this end, he went into a so-called rip deal with 1.2 million euros, the origin of which has not yet been clarified or is assumed to be access to employee accounts. In Venice he met with Levi Vass , an alleged diamond dealer from Israel, from whom he received the equivalent of 12 million euros in a suitcase. According to media information, he only noticed on the way back to the airport that only the top notes were genuine. Wagner wanted to confront mediator Heinz B. the next day and stayed in Italy for another night. The next morning, on the way to Leipzig, his plane crashed.

Acquisitions of business areas since bankruptcy

Fit travel

In November 2016, the German health tourism tour operator Fit Reisen from Frankfurt am Main announced the takeover of the Unister business from kurz-mal-weg.de . The location in Leipzig and the brand name were kept unchanged, the employees were also taken over.

Rockaway Capital

On December 23, 2016, the investment company Rockaway Capital SE from the Czech Republic announced the takeover of the Travel division from Unister. These are the online platforms ab-in-den-urlaub.de, fluege.de, Reisen.de, Billigfluege.de, reisegeier.de, Urlaubstours.de, hotelreservierung.de and TravelViva. The transaction is being financed by Rockaway Capital and the Chinese conglomerate CEFC (China Energy Company Limited).

solute gmbh

Also on December 23, 2016, Karlsruhe-based solute gmbh, operator of the online portal billiger.de , announced the takeover of the online platform shopping.de. As part of an asset deal, solute gmbh took over the entire business operations including the trademark rights and the IT infrastructure via a subsidiary.

Portfolio

Figures in millions
segment portal Online since Unique user Page views Visits
to travel ab-in-den-urlaub.de 2003 2.52 73.18 6.21
Urlaubstours.de 2006 0.09 0.24 0.11
fluege.de 2008 1.80 21.16 4.02
hotelreservierung.de 2008 0.69 13.33 1.88
traveler 2008 1.12 17.46 2.28
Kurz-mal-weg.de 2011 0.27 1.36 0.4
holidayreporter.com 2012 - - -
media news.de 2008 6.41 25.84 15.32
börsennews.de 2009 0.43 1.19 0.57
webmail.de (discontinued in 2013) 2009 0.11 19.22 2.85
Social web webcity.de (discontinued in 2013) 2006 0.14 31.99 0.94
partnersuche.de 2009 - - -
Shopping auvito.de (discontinued in 2014) 2006 1.21 4.54 2.06
shopping.de 2009 0.81 5.00 2.52
Automobiles auto.de 2006 0.81 16.56 1.99
Finances aktienchancen.de 2010 - - -
kredit.de 2008 0.02 0.06 0.03
versicherungen.de 2003 0.08 0.23 0.11
property myimmo.de 2009 - - -

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Unister boss Wagner rejects rip-off allegations. Retrieved July 23, 2012 .
  2. Federal Gazette
  3. netz-trends.de: Unister ten years old: Success story of Thomas Wagner and his 1,500 employee company
  4. a b Heinz-Roger Dohms: A mysterious bankruptcy and its consequences. tagesschau.de , July 21, 2016, accessed on July 22, 2016 .
  5. www.unister.de/firma/standort.html , accessed on April 1, 2010
  6. Marketing Ranking AGOF - Online Advertising Working Group ( Memento of the original dated December 31, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. dated December 26, 2012.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.agof.de
  7. welt.de: Unister dismisses around a tenth of its employees , July 20, 2015
  8. sale of geld.de at JDC Group. Retrieved May 30, 2016 .
  9. geld.de is for sale. Retrieved May 30, 2016 .
  10. Flight from Venice to Leipzig: Unister boss dies in plane crash. Retrieved July 14, 2016 .
  11. Unister confirms: Also shareholder Oliver Schilling among crash victims. Retrieved July 14, 2016 .
  12. ^ Kai Gauselmann: Operator of fluege.de Internet giant Unister files for bankruptcy. In: MZ. Mitteldeutsche Zeitung, July 18, 2016, accessed on July 18, 2016 .
  13. Unister Holding ensures the ability to act. (No longer available online.) Unister, July 18, 2016, archived from the original on July 18, 2016 ; Retrieved July 18, 2016 (press release). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / medien.unister.de
  14. Who controls Unister through the bankruptcy , wiwo.de, July 18, 2016.
  15. Travel portals: First Unister subsidiary files for bankruptcy , heise.de, July 20, 2015
  16. Four insolvency applications So far 200 employees have been affected by Unister insolvencies ( memento of the original from July 21, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , mdr.de, July 21, 2016  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.mdr.de
  17. ^ Subsidiary U-Deals insolvent Unister: Apparently thousands of customers affected , n-tv.de, July 21, 2016
  18. Holding and twelve Unister subsidiaries insolvent Almost 900 Unister employees affected by insolvency , Manager Magazin, July 29, 2016
  19. Right-wing extremists have a say in Unister , Die Zeit 35/2016, August 18, 2016.
  20. Unister subsidiary: Ab-in-den-Urlaub.de applies for insolvency , Spiegel Online, September 1, 2016.
  21. Unister business model burst years ago , capital.de, August 15, 2016
  22. a b The company is bankrupt, the boss died under mysterious circumstances, public prosecutors are investigating. Who wants to buy this store? , Die Zeit, August 21, 2016
  23. Christian Schlesinger: Unister: The dubious methods of the travel giant. In: Wirtschaftswoche , September 15, 2011, accessed on June 9, 2012.
  24. ↑ The consumer advice center warns of the fluege.de travel portal. June 1, 2012, archived from the original on October 5, 2013 ; Retrieved November 28, 2013 .
  25. (Source) ( Memento of the original from February 2, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / hottelling.net
  26. Consumer advocates warn against rip-offs. Hidden fees on the travel portal "fluege.de" . bild.de , accessed on June 12, 2012.
  27. Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk : Unister is not allowed to advertise with a consumer protection seal. Archived from the original on October 21, 2012 ; Retrieved July 3, 2012 .
  28. Warning signs for Unister boss Wagner . In: Wirtschaftswoche , accessed on June 12, 2012.
  29. Unister: COMPUTER BILD reveals rip-offs . Article at computerbild.de as an e-paper, accessed on July 2, 2012.
  30. heise online : New allegations against travel portal operator Unister. Retrieved July 3, 2012 .
  31. Unister sends out warnings for critical blog articles .
  32. FAZ.net / Martin Gropp December 21, 2012: Unister Managing Director: Allegations are unfounded .
  33. Unister boss Wagner: "200 jobs - nobody cares about that in the city". Retrieved April 30, 2018 .
  34. Unister boss Thomas Wagner attacks Leipzig's OBM Burkhard Jung: "Disinterested and inactive in creating new jobs" The dispute over the planned Unister new building escalates ( Memento from April 30, 2018 in the Internet Archive )
  35. Internet company Unister Holding GmbH founds a new location in Magdeburg - Schweinfurt, however, is not yet out of the running for the new headquarters. ( Memento of the original from February 25, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , schwex.de, February 21, 2010 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.swex.de
  36. ^ Jens Rometsch: Unister dispute: Leipzig signals approval of new building designs . ( Memento of the original from March 24, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Leipziger Volkszeitung , March 10, 2010, accessed on February 18, 2015. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / nachrichten.lvz-online.de
  37. Unister reports: Successful compromise in the new building. In: l-iz.de , March 24, 2010.
  38. ^ Public scolding helps . In: Immobilien Zeitung , March 4, 2010, edition 09/2010, p. 29. Retrieved on December 26, 2012.
  39. New anger about Unister projects. ( Memento of the original from July 26, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: lvz-online.de , July 23, 2010. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / nachrichten.lvz-online.de
  40. Unister new building in the city of Leipzig is to start in autumn. ( Memento of the original from September 25, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: lvz-online.de , April 29, 2011. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / nachrichten.lvz-online.de
  41. Unister renounces company headquarters - building site in Leipzig city sold. In: Leipziger Volkszeitung , accessed on December 21, 2015.
  42. ^ Raid on Unister , heise online , December 11, 2012, accessed on December 11, 2012
  43. Unister manager arrested during raid Wirtschaftswoche online, December 11, 2012, accessed on December 21, 2012
  44. touristik aktuell: Unister regrets cancellation by TUI ( Memento of the original from December 22, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.touristik-aktuell.de archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . December 19, 2012, accessed December 21, 2012.
  45. Unister managing director: Allegations are unfounded . In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , December 21, 2012.
  46. Internet giant is said to have cheated on customers . Stern.de, December 19, 2012.
  47. http://www.freipresse.de/NACHRICHTEN/SACHSEN/Thueringens-Regierungssprecher-Zimmermann-wird-Unister-Chef-artikel8428755.php
  48. Lieberknecht in distress
  49. ^ The Unister files: The most important facts about the trial in: Leipziger Volkszeitung , March 12, 2016, accessed on March 31, 2016
  50. Criminal proceedings against those responsible for the Unister Group at the Leipzig Regional Court ( Memento of the original from March 31, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Regional Court Leipzig , March 11, 2015, accessed on March 31, 2016 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.justiz.sachsen.de
  51. ^ Kai Gauselmann: Operator of fluege.de Internet giant Unister files for bankruptcy. In: MZ. Mitteldeutsche Zeitung, July 18, 2016, accessed on July 18, 2016 .
  52. Unister Holding ensures the ability to act. (No longer available online.) Unister, July 18, 2016, archived from the original on July 18, 2016 ; Retrieved July 18, 2016 (press release). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / medien.unister.de
  53. Who controls Unister through the bankruptcy , wiwo.de, July 18, 2016.
  54. Travel portals: First Unister subsidiary files for bankruptcy , heise.de, July 20, 2015
  55. Four insolvency applications So far 200 employees have been affected by Unister insolvencies ( memento of the original from July 21, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , mdr.de, July 21, 2016  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.mdr.de
  56. ^ Subsidiary U-Deals insolvent Unister: Apparently thousands of customers affected , n-tv.de, July 21, 2016
  57. Tanja Treser, Florian Zerfaß: His company Unister owes 10 million euros to Google. In: Bild.de , July 23, 2016.
  58. ^ Heinz-Roger Dohms: Ab-in-die-Pleite.de. In: Die Zeit , July 29, 2016.
  59. Insolvency application: Unister Group: Almost 40 million euros in debt , internetworld.de, July 25, 2016
  60. Saxony is claiming back around 1.4 million euros in funding from Unister ( Memento of the original from September 12, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , mdr.de, September 11, 2016 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.mdr.de
  61. Jerome Nussbaum: Did the Unister boss plunder the employee accounts? In: Picture , July 28, 2016.
  62. Juliane Werner: The debt chaos of the Unister. In: finanzen-heute.com , July 26, 2016.
  63. Wagner noticed the counterfeit money in the taxi to the airport. In: Die Welt , July 22, 2016.
  64. Unister: Fit Reisen takes over kurz-mal-weg.de. Retrieved February 15, 2017 .
  65. Michaela Papzezova: Rockaway Capital acquires Unister Travel Assets ab-in-den-urlaub.de and fluege.de. rockawaycapital.com, December 23, 2016, accessed December 25, 2016 .
  66. UNISTER insolvency: billiger.de buys shopping.de | presse.shopping.de. Retrieved May 11, 2017 .
  67. AGOF internet facts 2010-II ( memento of the original from October 13, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.agof.de
  68. a b IVW 09-2010
  69. a b kurz-mal-weg.de - All usage data (as of December 2016). Retrieved February 22, 2017 .
  70. AGOF internet facts 2009-IV
  71. a b IVW 02-2010