At Travel Startups Incubator (TSI) we have spent the better part of 2-years thinking about how to improve the process of prospecting, vetting and investing in travel technology startups. Our thesis from the beginning has been to identify and support talented entrepreneurs solving real travel industry problems.
Today we would like to highlight how our process has evolved, and how it led us to Flightsayer, a company we believe has extraordinary potential.
Our process for identifying new technology in travel is a combination of tapping our deep travel industry network for leads and feedback, using our instincts honed over decades of experience in the industry, and supplementing our research with online data mining of news and events in important industry verticals.
The process has matured rapidly, leading to the build out of proprietary internal software tools to help us streamline and continue to improve how we engage with new travel technology startups. Knowing how difficult it is to navigate the investment/partnership landscape in the travel industry, we decided to open up our tools to travel founders, corporations and investors through the TSI Deal Flow Platform.
Current solutions for travel technology startups and corporate travel companies to connect, network, build new relationships and commence deals include digital networks like LinkedIn and AngelList, and in-person events such as Phocuswright’s Travel Innovation Summit, Travel Tech Con in San Francisco and Travel 2.0 in New York City. We often hear that entrepreneurs get lost in the large and broad-based online networks, and the latter are either too expensive or too limited to a specific geography.
The TSI Deal Flow Platform is global with no boundaries and can quickly scale introductions and connectivity in the travel industry. We provide feedback, make partnership/investor suggestions, and make introductions solely through the Deal Flow Platform which helps us greatly streamline these processes and effectively make connections at scale. (more…)
On Wednesday November 30th, Travel Startups Incubator (TSI) ran a travel startup pitch session at day one of the VISIT FLORIDA Digital Innovation Forum. TSI brought in 11 travel tech startups to present to 125 travel executives from around Florida. Expedia presented at the closing of the day. The event sold out and was a great success.
Each startup presented for 5-minutes, then received 3-minutes of Q&A from a panel of veteran travel executives:
- Danielle Hollander – CMO Visit Orlando
- Sharon Siskie – SVP, Sales Disney Destinations
- Terry Prather – Former President of SeaWorld and Executive Director of the Florida Council of Tourism Leaders
Day two of the conference featured presentations from Facebook and Google.
The day capped off with a reception in the evening where each startup received a table to run demos and meet in-person with all of the attendees. The reception area was packed and the startups raved about the engagement and interest they received from the travel executives.
A special thanks to Paul Phipps, Chief Marketing Officer VISIT FLORIDA, Becca Smith Digital Strategy Manager VISIT FLORIDA, and David Atkins, interim Chief Digital Officer VISIT FLORIDA for having us and helping organize a fantastic event. Also in attendance were Kerri Zeil, Dir. Amadeus for Startups a TSI advisor and mentor and strategic partner, and Mike Spotswood, Nicole Zito’s father who helped us videotape the conference.
“It was a pleasure working with Travel Startups Incubator, and even more wonderful that they are a Florida based company. They brought eleven innovative technology companies who presented in a rapid-fire format which was the perfect fit for our inaugural Digital Innovation Forum. We look forward to working with them again for future events.” -Becca Smith, Digital Strategy Manager, VISIT FLORIDA
Matt, Nicole and Mike, the team at Travel Startups Incubator, did an amazing job orchestrating Neirbi’s experience at the VISIT FLORIDA Digital Innovation Forum. The event ran very smoothly and provided my company with excellent exposure and feedback in a friendly “shark tank” style presentation. The event concluded with a cocktail reception where we were provided table space to engage with and run demos for attendees that had follow-up questions. The whole experience was a very productive and efficient way for me to engage travel industry executives who have a high likelihood of being interested in Neirbi. – Ryan Duques, Co-Founder Neirbi
“Presenting at the Visit Florida Digital Innovation forum was a highly valuable opportunity for Alpaca Maps. It provided us with great brand exposure, and the ability to get in front of the decision makers in a range of companies and tourism organisations. The presentation and question format also provided worthwhile feedback on our messaging and product offering. Overall, the Travel Startup Incubator team did a fantastic job of facilitating a great event, and I wouldn’t hesitate being part of an event like this again.” -Zoe Manderson, Co-Founder Alpaca Maps
Below are some of the presentations (click to download PDF) from the companies as well as a collage of pictures from the conference and evening reception.
ALICE (Platform connecting every department of a hotel with their guests)
Alpaca (Mapping/storytelling tools for DMOs, hotels, activity providers and more)
Bandwango (Destination marketing and experience platform)
Flightsayer (Flight cancellation predictions)
Flip.to (Hotel advocacy platform)
FlitWays (Ground transportation aggregator)
Hitlist (Flight deal alerts and marketing platform)
iResponze (Guest feedback management service)
Neirbi (Predictive demand for hotels)
Tagible (Automated rich media content aggregation)
TraknProtect (Inventory tracking and analytics platform for hotels)
FlitWays Technology Inc. has gone public. FlitWays trades publicly under the stock symbol FTWS. FlitWays Technology lead by CEO Tobi Mac and Director of Growth Zacky Hamraz has been growing fast and this summer their team decided the best route to raising capital and growing the company was to go public.
This is Travel Startups Incubator® first exit from our portfolio of 19 travel tech startups so we couldn’t be more excited, says Matt Zito, managing partner. The FlitWays exit from our portfolio came fairly quickly as we have been operating as a seed-investor for 2-years.
FlitWays route to going public is somewhat unconventional here in the US at such an early-stage but was strategic in nature and makes the move that much more brilliant. Uber and Lyft are two of the biggest names in travel tech ground transportation valued at billions of dollars yet the average individual investor can’t get access to invest, due their being private companies.
FlitWays leverages the hottest market in travel ground transportation and for the first time enables investors in the US to invest in this fast growing sector. By going public FlitWays creates a competitive advantage for itself against it’s peers and opens up a larger base of investment opportunity.
Going public as an early stage tech startup is nothing new overseas. Over 100 Australian tech startups have gone public in the last two years. Citing, venture capitalists in the US scaling back their investments and VCs wanting to invest further downstream, Flamingo an AI-focused Fintech startup went public recently on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX).
Noteworthy travel tech company Yatra recently announced it will be going public and Trivago just recently announced that they will be having an upcoming IPO.
Airlines Technology (AT), an IT Solutions provider and portfolio company of Travel Startups Incubator has signed a commercial agreement with British airways (BA) to provide NDC (New Distribution Capability) aggregation services. AT’s aggregation services will enable BA to sell its inventory and ancillary services through third-party distributors such as online travel agencies.
Airlines Technology is one of the first companies in the Asia-Pacific region to offer NDC-based aggregation services to British Airways. AT aims to become a preferred choice for OTAs who wish to sell ancillary services like Wi-Fi, food, extra legroom, priority boarding, or special services like wine, wheelchair, etc. for creating a seamless travel experience.
BA is looking forward to encouraging direct connections via NDC. This will not only boost airline revenue but also improve the flying experience for the traveler by leaps and bounds, giving them access to purchase the amenities they want wherever they shop.
With over 10 billion in passenger revenues last year, British Airways is one of the biggest air carriers in the world. British Airways merged with Iberia in January 2011, formally creating the International Airlines Group (IAG), the world’s third-largest airline group in terms of annual revenue and the second largest in Europe.
Smriti Kumar, Paras Kumar and Varun Bansal founded Airlines Technology in mid 2015 and anticipate tremendous growth over the next few years. The number of global airline-related transactions is estimated to increase from 1.75 billion now to 3 billion by 2020. India is expected to be the third largest aviation market in the next 10 years, overtaking the UK.
IATA, which represents 265 airlines comprising 83 per cent of global air traffic, expects 7.2 billion passengers to fly by 2035, almost double the current number of 3.8 billion. The expected growth is to factors like emerging middle class, diverging demographics and liberalization of aviation markets.
AT is currently looking for more airline partners and OTAs to join the growing aggregation platform for NDC content distribution. AT also works directly with airlines to help them become fully NDC compliant. AT is an IATA-certified NDC Level 3 vendor.
Thirteen up-and-coming travel startups focused on local experiences, destinations and operations were mutually selected by Travel Startups Incubator and VISIT FLORIDA to present their companies and innovative travel technology at the VISIT FLORIDA Digital Innovation Forum on November 30, 2016 at the Omni Resort Orlando in Orlando, Florida.
On day 1 of the conference (Nov 30) each presenter will have 5-minutes to present their technology products to a group of 100+ travel executives followed by a 3-minute Q&A. Following the presentations, there will be a reception sponsored by VISIT FLORIDA for networking opportunities between the presenters and the attendees.
The following 13 companies will be presenting: (more…)
