Hotelmize start-up seeks hotel bookings revolution

Hotelmize, a big-data startup that works to optimize profits for hotel wholesalers, bed banks and travel agents, has raised a total of $3.8 million in seed funding.

Leading the round was Investible, an Australian-based early-stage investment group that has previously invested in globally successful companies such as Canva, Ipsy and Brandless.

Hotelmize applies the principles of capital market trading to the hotel booking industry.

The idea behind Hotelmize first came to CEO Dor Krubiner while he was planning his summer vacation.

Noticing a large number of rate changes for his desired hotel, Dor understood that hotel rooms – like stock options – are tradable commodities.

Krubiner joined forces with Omry Litvak and Guy Levitan in 2015 to found Hotelmize, a solution for the hotel booking industry generating higher profits from existing sales.

Through the use of artificial intelligence and big data, the UK-based Hotelmize leverages price fluctuations to the resellers' advantage.

The company is on track to manage over one billion dollars in total booking volume over the coming year.

Hotelmize operates within the competitive and complex hotel bookings market comprised of aggregators, bed banks, online travel agents, and wholesalers.

Because most resellers access the same hotel room inventory, they have few ways to differentiate themselves other than by price or market presence, and find their profit margins squeezed in their quest to compete.

Hotelmize addresses the challenge through their price-prediction and room-mapping algorithms, which optimize purchasing methods and increase reseller's profitability.

“With an extremely talented but lean technical and sales team, Hotelmize has already demonstrated the global application of the platform by securing clients across four continents,” Investible chairman Trevor Folsom said.

“We believe the alignment of Hotelmize to its clients will be one of the keys to its scalability.”