TA Venture invests $ 1.2 M in InBed.me

TA Venture Venture Fund together with a group of international investors has invested in InBed.me startup, a website allowing to reserve accommodation for the trip. $ 1.2 M investment will be spent on business development in targeted regions. InBed.me allows travelers to come to an arrangement about reserving a joint housing for the trip planned through the Internet or mobile phone.

InBed.me service is oriented at budget travel market, its main users are particularly students and young people prefering to stay in hostels during the travel. Before reserving a place, the users can check who will stay in the planned location, as well as check out profiles of the future neighbors and even contact them before traveling. This format makes the trip more than socializing at the stage of accommodation reserving. Users can get acquainted with each other in online mode, share recommendations and sightseeing plans before the arrival.

Since its launch in November 2011, the company has attracted more than 2000 hostel-hotels, and the number of users is growing rapidly. Mastering the market, the company has developed partnership with Hostelworld.com, which is a global leader in the market for online reserving places in the hostels. The partnership will integrate Hostelworld register into the InBed.me system, which will provide customers the opportunity to reserve places in almost 25,000 budget mini-hotels around the world. The service monetization model is commission for reserving.

The company currently focuses on the South America as the most popular continent among students and young travelers. In addition, the hostel service sees great opportunities for business development during the FIFA World Cup in Brazil in 2014. Further the company plans to enter the European market.

InBed.me is the first social exchange of hostels and temporary budget accommodation. The company makes online travel planning more social, allowing the users to know in advance who will be in the same place at the same time to coordinate their travel. As a result, users get more personalized social experiences during their travels. We are content of our investment in InBed.me and are confident that the company will become the global leader in social housing orders for travelers, - said Victoria Tigipko, the TA Venture director.

The idea of InBed.me service came after the tourist trips to Europe. We found out that an important part of the journey is the communication experience with other people, therefore we thought of using the social technologies in the web to help build these relationships - tells Diego Saez-Giles, the InBed.me co-founder and CEO. - We are glad that working with adherer investors, such as TA Venture, who believe in our idea and will be our strategic partner to conquest, in particular, the markets of Western and Eastern Europe.