Startups

Altimeter Capital's new venture capital fund won't be exclusively devoted to travel startups, but expect to see it making news along the lines of Concur's larger Perfect Trip Fund, which indeed concentrates on travel.

Trover is a beautiful and fun photo-sharing app, but the company faces some of the same challenges that most startups confront: How do you scale the business so users know you exist? With an additional $2.5 million in funding from Concur, and with other well-connected backers involved, little Trover can hang around for awhile.

The study points to the positive aspects of Airbnb's live-like-a-local positioning and the sense of community the brand can offer its hosts and renters, but also highlights the challenges of making that happen in its most popular markets.

News of the other acquisition this morning was a relief for anyone struggling to get good information from their iPhone using Apple's maps. The addition of fan favorite HopSpot should improve matters even more.

It looks like that supposed great divide between vacation rentals and Airbnb-style apartment rentals and shares isn't so immense. Or at least HomeAway will find out if it is cut out for the sharing economy.

Boat sharing avoids many of the regulations that make the sharing economy especially difficult to disrupt in the housing and auto industries, leaving quality and safety as the predominant determinants of success.