Airbnb’s Chinese rival raises US$300mil

BEIJING: Airbnb’s biggest rival in China, Tujia.com, has raised US$300mil to fund a rapid expansion and ride a surge in Chinese families taking holidays around the world.

Online travel giant Ctrip.com International Ltd and All-Stars Investment Ltd led a round that valued the company at more than US$1.5bil, it said in a statement confirming an earlier Bloomberg report.

That’s up sharply from a valuation of over US$1bil when it last tapped financing in 2015.

China’s largest vacation rental platform now handles more than 650,000 listings globally, focused on serving the world’s largest population of domestic and international travellers.

Tujia’s latest fund-raising comes as Airbnb quadruples its Chinese tech team to grow its domestic market share. It now has around 100,000 listings there and is fighting to convince the same group of middle-class consumers to use its services instead of domestic rivals.

China Renaissance was an adviser to Tujia and its New Economy Fund, which is now known as the Huaxing Growth Capital fund, was an investor in the round. Glade Brook Capital – a backer of Airbnb – also took part along with G Street Capital, which was advised by Macquarie Capital.

Tujia is intent on taking its rivalry with Airbnb global, including in Japan – one of the most popular destinations for Chinese tourists.

The Beijing-based startup aims to increase the number of properties available for holiday rental there to about 100,000 by 2019 from 10,000 now, Tomoko Suzuki, chief executive officer of the Japanese unit, told