Hotel search site Room 77 gets its CEO: Jetsetter founder Drew Patterson
Skift Take
Online travel "supermarkets" Travelocity and Expedia years ago looked like winners, but hotel "specialist" Booking.com prevailed, Room 77 argues. And, it's betting that a singular focus on hotels will one day enable Room 77 to out-Kayak Kayak. It's a huge hill to climb.
After a several-month CEO search, the heavily-funded hotel search startup Room 77 has its first official CEO: Jetsetter co-founder and CEO Drew Patterson.
A surprise pick, Patterson left flash-sales site Jetsetter amidst controversy 10 months ago and in the interim co-founded a hotel and mobile software startup, CheckMate.io, which is still at a very early stage. As part of the hiring, Room 77 has also absorbed CheckMate, and co-founder Adam Rugel and others on the team will come along.
Patterson was out raising money for Checkmate and had already raised some from Twitter co-founder Biz Stone and former Twitter Chief Scientist Abdur Chowdhury. Post-acquisition, Room 77 will continue developing Checkmate's main product, an app that enables hotel guests to check-in from their mobile phones.
In an interview with Skift, Patterson, who was VP of marketing at Kayak for three years before co-founding Gilt Groupe's Jetsetter in 2009, said no company has "claimed the mantle of leadership" in mobi
