First Choice Holidays, the Crawley-based holiday firm, has bought a controlling interest in Citalia Holidays.

Citalia specialises in holidays to Italy and Spain and short breaks to European cities and is owned by CIT International and Camillo De Simone, Citalia's managing director.

First Choice is to buy 75 per cent of Citalia while the remaining 25 per cent will be held by Mr De Simone, who will continue to run the business.

The net assets of the business at 31 December 2000 were £7.1 million. First Choice has the option to acquire the outstanding 25 per cent during the next three years.

Citalia's major brand Citalia Italy is recognised as one of the UK's leading premium tour operators traditionally offering holidays to Italian destinations and more recently an extended city portfolio to all major European destinations.

A Spanish programme, The Real Spain, was introduced at the start of 2000 with a high quality product offering holidays across mainland Spain and The Canary Islands.

The acquisition is seen as a further step in First Choice's strategy of specialising in destination led markets and increases the group's existing European city break portfolio.

The business generated revenues of £36 million and carried approximately 52,000 passengers in the year ending 31 December 2000.

Citalia's management team will continue with the business following completion.

First Choice chief executive Peter Long said: "The union of First Choice with Citalia in this joint transaction will create a dynamic and specialist business unit.

"Citalia sits well alongside our existing stable of premium niche tour operations and further strengthens our portfolio of specialist brands."