UK travel player gets $15m for Asia push

Ventech, DN Capital and DSG Consumer Partners also participated. It brings the company’s total capital raised to date to $25 million. Ventech led a $6.5 million round for the company earlier this year. Previous investors also include Initial Capital and Avala Capital.

“Sansiri approached us with an exciting proposition to take our brand to Asia which was always on our roadmap,” Nakul Sharma, Hostmaker’s founder and CEO, said in a statement. “Along with Gaw Capital’s Asian roots and global footprint, it felt like the right moment to accelerate our expansion in the East.”

Hostmaker was founded in 2014 with an aim to use proprietary pricing technology as well as an in-house interior design and hotel operations team to improve customer experience in the short-term rentals space. The company claims to have carried out more than 150,000 homestay-related service transactions in areas, including housekeeping, photography, pricing reviews, guest relations and vetting, and interior design.

Airbnb is said to have some 150 million customers globally, although this market share is understood to be weighted heavily toward Western geographies. Asian competitors attracting private equity interest in recent years include Japan’s Hyakusen Renma, Indonesia’s Travelio, and China’s Tujia, the latter of which received a $300 million round earlier this year.  

Gaw invests across a number of real estate segments, including logistics warehouses, residential development, offices, retail malls, and hospitality. It claims to have raised $8.6 billion since 2005 and control $13 billion of assets under management as of the second quarter of 2017.

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• Topics
• Europe
• Support services
• Technology
• Real estate
• Asia
• Gaw Capital Partners
• TMT
• DSG Partners Asia