Month: April 2018

TravelTriangle, a startup that is digitizing travel agencies and travel bookings in India, has raised a $12 million Series C round led by Fundamentum.

The startup operates like a travel booking platform to allow holidaymakers to choose and secure their travel plans online. It also works with offline travel agents to help them offer services, such as tailoring a trip, to customers as they do when they walk into their offices in person. The company also offers a suite of back-office services designed for agencies to help bring them on to its platform and generate additional revenue.

The deal marks the first investment from Fundamentum, a new $100 million fund established by Nandan Nilekani, a co-founder and the former CEO of $33 billion IT services giant Infosys, and Helion Ventures partner Sanjeev Aggarwal .

When the fund launched last July, Nilekani told TechCrunch it is aimed at turning promising Indian startups into unicorns. Notably, Nilekani confirmed that Fundamentum has looked over some 50 deals before electing to back TravelTriangle.

Fundamentum led the round — and may perhaps hog the limelight a little given the circumstances — but the firm was joined by existing TravelTriangle backers SAIF Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners and RB investments who also took part.

TravelTriangle closed a $10 million Series B in February 2017, since then it has seen its site traffic jump from two million to 2.5 million per month, while it has grown the number of active travel agents on its platform to “close to 700.”

Sankalp Agarwal, TravelTriangle’s CEO and one of three co-founders behind the business, told TechCrunch that the money will be spent on product R&D. In particular, he said, a recommendation engine is being developed that will help customers get holiday ideas based both on their own history and the type of trips and destinations that other customers who are similar to them have taken.

On that front, TravelTriangle is also working to broaden its selection of destinations that it offers from the current total of 65. That means finding new partners outside of India.

Agarwal said, too, that a chunk of the new capital will towards marketing campaigns aimed at growing Travel Triangle’s brand and generating awareness among consumers.

He said there’s no immediate plan to focus on expanding the business overseas. He did acknowledge, though that already the service has picked up some overseas customers — particularly in Sri Lanka — and that, as an online platform, it would be possible to replicate overseas.

Most likely, international expansion would be something that is two to three years away, he added, as Travel Triangle is aiming to reach double-figures of market share within India’s travel industry. Outbound tourism alone is tipped to reach $45 billion by 2022, according to research, while in-country travel accounts for the majority of trips.

from TechCrunch

Retail has been revolutionized over the last decade, with brands like Casper and Warby Parker offering high-quality goods at lower costs simply by selling them through the internet.

Koio, a relatively new high-end sneaker brand, is looking to get in on the new retail wave, and the company has some fresh cash to do it.

Koio has just announced the close of a $3 million Series A funding led by Action Capital, with participation from Brand Foundry Ventures, Winkelvoss Capital, actor Miles Teller and director and producer Simon Kinberg, among others.

Koio was founded Chris Wichert and Johannes Quodt, who were sick of spending so much on high-end leather sneakers. The brand focuses on making nice shoes available at a relatively lower price while maintaining high quality products. Most of Koio’s shoes run for around $250.

The company works with a Chanel factory in Italy for all manufacturing, and no piece of the production is outsourced.

But what’s more interesting to consumers is that Koio’s strategy includes collaborations. The company has partnered with tattoo artist Jonboy, surfer Lindsey Davis, and even Game of Thrones for limited run sneakers, all of which have sold out quickly.

Koio launched in late 2015, and saw 400 percent YOY growth in 2017. The company has also started launching pop-up shops, with one in NYC and one launching today in Los Angeles.

“It’s really important to us that we build Koio in an authentic and sustainable way and that our authenticity is transparently communicated to customers in the digital age,” said Wichert.

from TechCrunch

German insurance giant Allianz is following Google and Tencent by backing Go-Jek, the Indonesia-based ride-hailing and local services company valued at over $4.5 billion, after it announced an investment.

The money comes from Allianz X, the firm’s digital investment arm, which confirmed it put in $35 million in what is its first deal in Southeast Asia. The group has previously backed startups like European challenger bank N26 (alongside Tencent), and emerging market micro-insurance service provider Bima.

Allianz participated in an estimated $1.5 billion Go-Jek funding round that includes participation from the likes of Google, Tencent, Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com, China-based delivery service Meituan and others. The round opened last year when Tencent, the $500 billion Chinese firm, made an investment, but we understand that it is now closed at a valuation that exceeds $4.5 billion. Go-Jek has yet to officially announce or confirm the funding, however.

Go-Jek and Allianz have had a relationship for the past two years, with Allianz Indonesia supporting the company by offering health insurance for Go-Jek drivers and their families. The insurance company said it has plans to “increase access to insurance products and services” for Go-Jek partners and customers. That makes sense given that Go-Jek is moving into financial services products in Indonesia.

“Go-Jek has demonstrated a track record of success within the transportation, logistics and payment sectors and we look forward to supporting their continued growth,” Nazim Cetin, CEO of Allianz X, said in a statement.

Hot on the heels of Grab’s acquisition of Uber Southeast Asia, Go-Jek is working to move into four new marks during April. TechCrunch understands that it has hired country management and operational teams in the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, while it is also looking into options in Singapore.

Go-Jek started out operating a bike taxi on-demand service, but it has since added taxi and private car options, a mobile payment business and local services on-demand, such as groceries, massages and more. The company is widely-heralded as the market leader in Indonesia, which is Southeast Asia’s largest economy and the world’s fourth biggest country with a population of over 260 million.

Indonesia is expected to be the main growth driver for Southeast Asia’s ride-hailing industry, which is forecast to see revenue jump from $5 billion in 2017 to over $20 billion in 2025, according to a recent report from Google and Singapore-based fund Temasek.

from TechCrunch

Zipjet, the on-demand laundry and dry cleaning service co-founded by Rocket Internet, has picked up further funding. Described as a “Series B extension,” the new round sees the likes of Henkel Ventures, Amsterdam Venture Partners, and BSH Home Appliances Group — the combined venture of Bosch and Siemens — make a “seven-figure” investment in the company, capital it plans to use for business and product development, including beefing up data-science and marketing.

Founded in 2014 by Florian Färber and Lorenzo Franzi on behalf of Germany’s most famous startup factory, Zipjet was an early mover in the European on-demand laundry and dry cleaning space. Operating in London, Paris and Berlin, the company offers an app and website that makes it super convenient to order a range of laundry and dry cleaning services, including pickup and return delivery. Garments can be cleaned, ironed, folded and delivered to customers “in as little as 24 hours”.

In many ways Zipjet can be viewed as a direct clone of Washio in the U.S., which shuttered in 2016 before being acquired for assets by rival Rinse. In the U.K., which has also seen consolidation, competitors include Laundrapp and the lesser-known and modestly funded Laundryheap. Late last year, Zipjet itself acquired French rival Cleanio.

Despite being an extension of a previous Series B and the exact amount remaining undisclosed, Zipjet’s latest funding is noteworthy because it is being spun as a “strategic” investment in relation to Henkel Ventures (investment arm of chemical and FMCG company Henkel), and Bosch and Siemens’ BSH Home Appliances Group. “This investment is about much more than money, it’s a strategic play with some of the world’s largest producers of washing machines and detergents. We will be able to collaborate on several projects, enabling us to service more customers and develop our product offering,” says Zipjet co-founder and CEO Florian Färber.

What those “projects” will look like, Zipjet isn’t saying, although I understand one being explored in the medium to long-term is giving existing Henkel and BSH Home Appliances Group customers the option to use Zipjet for a selection of clothing that requires extra service or convenience. Other potential ideas include turning partner locations into Zipjet “drop-off and pick-up” points or licensing Zipjet’s logistics software to partners.

Adds Uwe Blanarsch-Simon, Vice President Technical Product Management at BSH Home Appliances, in a statement: “The purpose of our business is to improve the quality of life of our consumers across the globe. Our goal is to serve our consumers with innovative appliances and solutions that make their everyday life easier and more enjoyable. The cooperation with Zipjet is a perfect complement for our core business in the laundry care section”.

from TechCrunch

Sweden’s Instabridge, the Wi-Fi sharing community and mobile app that has proved particularly popular in Brazil and Mexico, has scored $3 million in further funding — money it’s pegged for Asia expansion, starting with India.

The new round is led by Luminar Ventures (headed up by Magnus Bergman and Jacob Key), with participation from previous backers Balderton Capital, Draper Associates, Moor, and Creandum. The company had previously raised around $5 million.

Originally founded in late 2012 as a way to enable you to share your home Wi-Fi with friends on Facebook, the Stockholm-based company has since pivoted to become a broader Wi-Fi sharing community, and has found traction in developing markets where cellular data remains prohibitively expensive.

The Instabridge app lets you share the details of any Wi-Fi hotspot with other Instabridge users, and provides access to Wi-Fi hotspots shared by everyone else in the community. This has enabled it to build a crowdsourced database of Wi-Fi hotspots, in addition to a list of known public venues that have free Wi-Fi, such as McDonald’s or Starbucks.

Instabridge says it plans to build on the traction it has seen in South America by targeting India’s population of over 1 billion people, of which it says only 400 million currently have internet access. This, Instabridge co-founder Niklas Agevik tells me, will include building out a team in India, and plays into the company’s new-found mission of expanding internet access in developing countries where internet services remain relatively expensive and yet access to the internet is a proven means of “reducing income inequality”.

Meanwhile, I’m told that Instabridge is now seeing 2.3 million Monthly Active Users, and is growing at a rate of 50,000 new users per day. The Instabridge database now houses the details of 2 million Wi-Fi spots.

from TechCrunch

Liberis, the London-based fintech that provides finance for small businesses, has raised £57.5 million in new funding to help support the company’s growth. The alternative finance provider makes loans against a company’s future credit and debit card sales.

The majority of the new capital being raised by Liberis is debt, which in turn will enable it to issue more loans. The facility is being provided by British Business Investments (the commercial arm of the tax payer-funded British Business Bank), Paragon Bank, and BCI Ltd.

In addition, Blenheim Chalcot has made an equity investment into Liberis. The so-called “digital venture builder” also previously backed Clearscore, the credit scoring startup recently acquired by Experian.

Providing a new financing option as a replacement for a traditional bank loan or extended overdraft — which is increasingly hard for small businesses to come by — Liberis provides funding from £1,000 to £500,000 based on a company’s projected credit and debit card sales. However, the clever part is that the loan is paid back via a pre-agreed percentage of the business’ digital transactions, making it especially attractive to seasonal businesses that have very uneven sales throughout different times of the year. There isn’t a time limit placed on when a loan has to be repaid, either. Instead, the repayment schedule is directly tied to the size and pace of a small business’ card transactions.

In a call with Rob Straathof, CEO of Liberis, he conceded that this means the fintech startup is taking on more of the risk, but says the company is seeing the vast majority of loans paid back within the projected timeframe. To help manage risk and make the required sales projections, Liberis uses various data points, including transactions pulled in from a number payment platform partners such as Worldpay, and Sagepay. Similarly, it also integrates with take-out marketplace Just Eat, which gives the startup the ability to offer financing to small restaurants. The advent of Open Banking, which lets bank account holders share their transaction data via an API, will also enable Liberis to extend its reach.

Examples of small business customers given by Straathof include a local bakery that needs to invest in a new oven, a neighbourhood pub that wants to expand with a beer garden, or an online retailer that needs to incrementally restock to meet rising demand. “Our innovative product has proven particularly popular with retail and hospitality businesses where income fluctuates on a seasonal basis. New lending to small businesses by banks has been decreasing since Q4 16 and Liberis jumps into the void with our ‘pay as you earn’ funding solution,” he says in a statement.

To date, Liberis has helped over 7,000 small businesses, advancing £210 million in funding. However, it isn’t the only ‘pay as you earn’-styled finance provider. Amazon, of course, offers its own business financing based on Amazon Market transaction data. PayPal and Square also offer credit for retailers. Meanwhile, SME peer-to-peer lending platforms, such as Funding Circle, might also be viewed as a competitor.

from TechCrunch