Commerce and Travel Platform Deem Secures $50 Million in Funding

Deem, which sells travel and an array of other products and services to major corporations, raised $50 million in expansion capital from China private equity fund Hony Capital.

Formerly known as Rearden Commerce, Deem powers a platform to sell travel and related services for American Express Global Business Travel, an early investor, in the U.S. and U.K., and has reseller agreements for Deem’s corporate booking tool with Carlson Wagonlit Travel and Travel Leaders. In the corporate booking tool sector, Deem competes with the likes of Sabre’s GetThere and Concur.

Deem has also announced that this week that it engaged in recapitalization financing, led by PointGuard Ventures and mutual funds, along with participation by Deem’s founder and CEO, Patrick Grady after it reversed course in 2012 and 2013 and exited out of the financial services industry.

While Crunchbase states that Deem, founded in 2000, previously raised $467 million in funding, Grady tells Skift it is “very misleading to discuss total amount raised as those investments didn’t go into our core platform, apps and business.”

If Crunchbase’s numbers are correct then Deem would have raised more than $500 million in funding, although Grady doesn’t look at it this way.

Grady says less than $200 million has been raised for the company’s core business.

The company plans to use the new funding for network growth, international expansion and acquisitions.

Deem sells everything from travel services to office supplies, and yoga classes to a variety of credit card-linked offers to major corporations using what it describes as a Commerce-as-a Service platform.