TravelPerk Primed for Aggressive Growth With New Fundraising

Business travel platform TravelPerk has come a long way since its founding in 2015. Starting from its base in Barcelona, it continues opening new offices in Europe, and its team just keeps expanding.

The corporate travel industry has a ton of money, and more startups are coming in to compete, especially to serve small- and medium-size businesses. In fact, an announcement Thursday about new money raised by TravelPerk comes less than a month after TripActions revealed it had raised $250 million in new funding and four months after Lola raised $37 million.

TravelPerk has one main advantage, though. It has already built a strong base within Europe, an extremely difficult and fragmented market. To learn more, we talked to TravelPerk CEO Avi Meir about where the company is headed and plans for the new money.

We also keep you up to date on the latest in New Distribution Capability, with announcements from Southwest, Sabre, and the Airlines Reporting Corporation.

Check out these stories, and many more, below.

If you have any feedback about the newsletter or news tips, feel free to reach out via email at [email protected] or tweet @ikcarey.

— Isaac Carey, Travel Reporter

Featured Stories

Corporate Travel Booker TravelPerk Raises an Extra $60 Million: The company is doing well, considering it’s operating in one of the most difficult markets for business travel. Now it’s hinting at new, out-of-the-box products, but we’ll have to wait and see what those are.

Southwest Joins NDC Exchange for More Efficient Airline Booking: Sure enough, more travel companies are starting to inch toward direct booking. Southwest has always been a leader in this area among the big U.S. carriers, and this move will help it do more business with corporate travelers.

Military Veterans Launch New Careers as Travel Advisors: A travel advisor host agency is finding success with a scholarship program for military veterans geared toward utilizing their unique skill sets. It has the potential to be a win-win for both the agency and the veterans who have made the transition into new careers.

Momondo’s Viral Video Is a Piece of Kayak’s Brand Marketing Strategy: When Booking Holdings acquired Momondo in 2017 to pair with fellow metasearch brand Kayak, officials said one of Momondo’s core strengths was its brand marketing bonafides. The World Piece video works because it stirs emotions, and this type of dynamic can go a long way toward creating a relationship between consumers and brands.

The Future of Travel

StayPlease Raises Funds to Expand ‘Slack for Hotels’: Travel startups including Sonder, StayPlease, and Bolt released a series of funding announcements, many of them for undisclosed amounts.

Newark Airport Is Betting New Munich Operators Will Help It Go From Worst to Best: It’s no secret New York’s airports need an overhaul. Port Authority is bringing in the operator of one of the world’s best-regarded airports to do it — but structural challenges in the U.S. remain.

How Delta’s Loyalty Offering Is Improving Its Direct Booking Business: Another strong quarter for Delta. Investing to create more customer loyalty is paying off. What a concept: doing what it takes to keep people keep coming back.

Skift Senior Enterprise Editor Andrew Sheivachman [[email protected]] curates the Skift Corporate Travel Innovation Report. Skift emails the newsletter every Thursday.

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