Business travel platform TravelPerk has raised another $115 million in funding from investors to help continue its expansion.
The company, which is based in Chicago, London and Barcelona, intends to use the fresh investment to go “much deeper” in developing areas such as sustainable travel and expanding its product range, including the new TravelPerk Events tool, for its SME clients.
TravelPerk closed its latest Series D funding round with new investment from existing shareholder Kinnevik, as well as from new investor General Catalyst. Former Booking.com CEO Gillian Tans has also joined the board after investing personally in TravelPerk.
The company has now raised a total of $409 million across all fundraising rounds and its valuation has risen to $1.3 billion, meaning TravelPerk can now be classed as a “unicorn” in investment terms.
JC Taunay-Bucalo, TravelPerk’s chief commercial officer, told BTN Europe: “For this funding, it’s really very much a continuation of what we have been doing and it will allow us to go deeper into what we started to do in the last year.
“We have invested very significantly in the US market, sustainability and events. We are developing a great product for a new type of remote worker.”
Taunay-Bucalo said that TravelPerk’s expansion this year was likely to be a “mixture” of both organic growth and further acquisitions, although he added there was “nothing on the horizon” in terms of new acquistions.
2021 was a big year for deals for TravelPerk which snapped up UK-based TMC Click Travel and sustainability consultancy firm Susterra, as well as NexTravel in the US.
Taunay-Bucalo said one of TravelPerk’s main priorities was to provide “really accurate information to customers” on carbon emissions when booking, so that business travellers can decide to “travel as green as possible”.
“If you fast forward five years, carbon offsetting is going to be as important as the price and flexibility,” he added. “It will be part of the decision making of travellers.”
He also predicted that companies, which have introduced more flexible working arrangements, would be spending more on travel in the coming years as they still needed to bring remote workers together for regular face-to-face meeting.
“The desire for travel is there and companies want to meet face-to-face more than ever. The only thing preventing people from travelling is the complexity of doing it and duty of care,” said Taunay-Bucalo.
TravelPerk CEO Avi Meir added: “As time goes by, it is clear that there won’t be a replacement for the human touch. We are seeing data on our platform and we are feeling it ourselves.
“While some technologies are focused on virtual interactions, TravelPerk is building the technology that will help us get together in real life.”