Acai Travel has received $4 million in seed financing. The startup offers AI tools that optimize travel operations. Nauta led the investment in this New York-based company, which will be founded in 2023. DraperB1 as well as existing investor One Travel Ventures were also involved.
The funding will be used to further the startups’ goal to create an operating system for travel operations that is efficient and enhances the travel experience.
Acai, one of PhocusWire’s Hot 25 Travel Startups for 2024, counts among its customers travel companies such as Kiwi.com and Lastminute.com. In the beginning of this year, Globespan Travel Management announced a partnership with the company to use its AI technology for client updates.
“Acai is using AI to modernize travel operations with fast and easy-to-use tools so agents can focus on what they do best — delivering exceptional travel experiences. It’s exciting to raise a Seed from experienced investors who are backing us to resolve the industry challenge,” said Riccardo Vittoria.
Vittoria has worked with AI in travel for a while. In 2015 he co-founded 30SecondstoFly, an AI-powered booking engine for corporate travel, which was acquired by Amex GBT in 2020.
Henry Chen Weinstein is the co-founder and executive chairperson of Acai. He said, “In less than four months, we reduced average handling times by 20% for a TMC customer on a single account.”
“We can achieve a cost reduction of 70% by rolling out our entire suite of products and allowing agents who are not GDS-trained to manage complex requests.”
And said Jordi Viñas, general partner at Nauta, “COVID-19 restrictions caused a huge drop in demand for travel and subsequently led to many trained agents leaving the sector.”
Companies have struggled as demand has returned to pre-pandemic level. Acai Travel, using LLM technologies and sector expertise, transforms the travel operations of companies by enabling them to reduce handling time, hire untrained employees and build a more flexible workforce.
