Travel tech startups are hot and attracting record financing as they take on lodging, consumer booking (for flights, hotels, etc.), fare alerts, and much more in the broader travel category.
Just two countries — the US and China — have accounted for the majority of dollars going to travel tech, as seen below. In fact, the China and US share of global travel tech funding dollars has grown in recent years, shooting up from 59% of dollar investment in 2013 to 74% in 2015 through 12/24/15.
Using CB Insights data and analytics, we analyzed geographical trends domestically and internationally with deal and dollar trends across top countries and states.
We defined travel tech as tech-enabled companies offering services and products focused on tourism, including booking services, search and planning platforms, on-demand travel, and recommendation sites. Car-hailing services are excluded.
Deal and dollar share by geography
- From 2010 to 2015 year-to-date (YTD), US travel tech accounted for the plurality of all deal share at 39%.
- India and China accounted for 11% and 8% of deals, respectively, edging out other top countries like Germany, the UK, and Russia, which account for a small proportion of deal share.
- Countries in the “Other” category that account for 28% of deal share include France, Spain, and Singapore.
US startups also led in terms of dollar share, receiving almost 40% of global dollar funding to travel tech between 2010 and 2015.
Despite only receiving 8% of deal share, China took 32% of dollar share, indicating that although there were less deals in China than in India and the US, they were relatively large financings. Two large Chinese travel tech rounds that stand out are the $300M Series D to TuJia Online Information Technology in June 2015, and Mafengwo, which raised an $85M Series C in March 2015.
Dollar share for travel startups in the United Kingdom, India, Germany, and Brazil ranged from 3% to 6%, as seen below.
US dollar share of travel tech startup deals started at 81% in 2010, but stood at only 37% in 2015 year-to-date (YTD).
China has seen enormous growth in dollars put to work in travel tech startups. China went from 0% of global dollar share in 2010, to 32% in 2013 (surpassing the US) and has tied the US in 2015 at 37%. As noted above, given that China has less travel tech deals than the US, this is indicative of the large financing rounds occurring in China.
Deals by top country and state
The US, India, and China were the countries that have received the most deals since 2010.
- The US lead all countries in global deal activity and saw 103 deals in 2015 year-to-date, the largest number of deals completed in one year in any country.
- India leads all international countries with a total of 124 deals completed since 2010, and hit a 6-year high in 2015 with 69 deals, more than doubling China’s count.
- China has seen steady growth since 2010. In the six years analyzed below, China’s deal count went from 1 deal completed in 2010, to 16 in 2013, and 33 in 2015.
Unsurprisingly, California has received the most deals since 2010, followed by New York, and Massachusetts.
- California hit a multi-year high of 44 deals in 2015 year-to-date, a 238% increase in deals over 2010.
- New York deal activity has risen steadily since 2010, reaching a six-year high in 2015, with 19 deals completed.
- Massachusetts ranged between 1 and 9 deals completed between 2010 and 2015 year-to-date.
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