ITA Software

ITA Software is a travel industry software division of Google, formerly an independent company, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The company was founded by Jeremy Wertheimer, a computer scientist from the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and Cooper Union, with his partner Richard Aiken in 1996. On July 1, 2010 ITA agreed to be acquired by Google. On April 8, 2011, the US Department of Justice approved the buyout. As part of the agreement, Google must license ITA software to other websites for five years.

ITA's first product was an airfare search and pricing system called QPX. This system is now used by travel companies such as Bing Travel, Cape Air, CheapTickets, Kayak.com, and Orbitz, and by airlines such as Alitalia, American, ANA, United Airlines, US Airways, and Virgin Atlantic. ITA also hosts its own website based on QPX, although it's not possible to buy tickets from it.

ITA is known for using programming puzzles to attract and evaluate potential employees since 2001. Some of these puzzles have appeared in ads on Boston's MBTA subway system. ITA is also one of the highest-profile companies to base their software on Common Lisp.

In January 2006, ITA received $100 million in venture capital money from a syndicate of five investment firms led by Battery Ventures, marking the largest investment in a software firm in New England in five years.