Avi Meir, CEO and co-founder of corporate travel management startup TravelPerk.
travel allowance
LONDON — European corporate travel booking platform TravelPerk told CNBC on Tuesday it has acquired Chicago-based startup AmTrav to help it further expand in the United States.
AmTrav operates in the same space as TravelPerk and will continue to operate under the same brand and its entire team will continue to operate the business.
To help fund the deal and TravelPerk’s broader expansion efforts, the company also raised $135 million in debt financing from private equity firms Blackstone and Blue Owl.
TravelPerk CEO and co-founder Avi Meir told CNBC that the deal will allow the company to accelerate its growth in the United States. He expects the deal to double TravelPerk’s U.S. revenue and make the country its top revenue-generating region by 2026.
“Currently, the UK is our largest market,” Meir said in an interview with CNBC. He pointed out that the company’s acquisition of British business travel startup Click Travel in 2021 was a catalyst for its growth in the UK.
Meir said that going forward, TravelPerk’s acquisition of AmTrav will help support its “deep localization strategy” in the United States and enable it to “offer customers better pricing and inventory options through deeper relationships with suppliers.” .
He added that AmTrav has long had data exchange agreements with airline giants American Airlines and Southwest Airlines.
TravelPerk currently has more than 200 employees in the United States and plans to increase its U.S. headcount by another 35% by the end of 2024. Last year, the company’s revenue in the United States increased by 65%.
Global Business Travel Association estimate By 2023, the U.S. business travel industry will be worth $329 billion.
TravelPerk said its U.S. office footprint will expand to include AmTrav offices in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles and Miami. TravelPerk did not disclose financial terms of the deal.
2 years of M&A negotiations
AmTrav CEO Jeff Klee told CNBC that the company has been in talks with TravelPerk since 2021, adding that he was unwilling to sell the company he founded without assurance that its operations would not be affected by the acquisition.
“My bar for making a deal is pretty high,” Klee said in an interview with CNBC. “One of the things both companies have in common is that we are both software companies at heart, but we both recognize that within the travel industry, there is still a huge services component.”
“Travelers expect to do everything themselves until they don’t — when you get to the airport, if there’s a hurricane (or other disruption), you want someone to help you out…(so) service points are very important of.
All AmTrav employees will remain with the company and remain within their current teams, reporting to the same line manager, Klee said.
The only difference, he jokes, is that for the first time in 35 years, he and co-founder Craig Fichtelberg have a boss: TravelPerk’s CEO.
With an additional $135 million in funding from Backstone and Blue Owl, the company’s total funding raised in 2024 now stands at $240 million.
travel allowance In January 2024, it raised $104 million from investors including SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Blackstone, and Blue Owl.
“We are pleased to provide capital to enable TravelPerk to further execute on the company’s global growth strategy,” Blue Owl Capital Managing Director Kurt Tenenbaum told CNBC.
“Avi and the rest of the management team have demonstrated a track record of success, and we’re excited to see what they can accomplish in the long term.”
AmTrav was founded in 1989 by co-founders Klee and Fitchtelberg. The two met in a dormitory at the University of Michigan. AmTrav provides localized digital travel management for small and medium-sized enterprises.
The impact of artificial intelligence on business travel
TravelPerk said its business and AmTrav will seek to leverage proprietary technology and develop new artificial intelligence capabilities.
Meyer said he believes artificial intelligence will drive more in-person interactions, pointing to the company’s research findings 38% of CEOs believe artificial intelligence will increase the need for in-person meetings Business travel brings convenience.
The findings are based on a survey of business travel decision-makers, travelers and managers,
“For TravelPerk, the purpose of artificial intelligence is to make humans more efficient, not to replace humans,” Mayer told CNBC. “I believe in human connection. That’s what we exist as a company reason.”
“We remain focused on a human-centered approach to implementing artificial intelligence at TravelPerk, automating back-end tasks so our employees can spend more time engaging with colleagues, customers and partners.”
TravelPerk’s clients include companies such as Betterment, Adyen, Wise and Red Bull. AmTrav has more than 1,000 enterprise customers.
TravelPerk’s platform allows users to book business flights, hotels, trains and cars in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Portugal, India, Singapore, Mexico, Dubai and Israel.
Existing investors in TravelPerk include SoftBankGeneral Catalyst, Kinnevik, Greyhound Capital, Felix Capital, Target Global, LocalGlobe, Spark Capital and Heartcore.
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