When George Limbert began as president of Red Roof, he met with franchise operators of the hotel brand to better understand what was going well — and what was not.
25.08.2023 - 14:35 / skift.com / Justin Dawes / Richard Valtr
The hotel tech startup Mews has completed five acquisitions in the past three years. Its CEO, Richard Valtr, told Skift last week that there are two more underway.
He also said he expected to see more consolidation deals during this unstable economy. That makes sense because as a buyer, he is probably more tuned into the world of startups that want to sell.
For Mews and other travel tech startups backed by venture capital, now is a great time to acquire because of low valuations. But, for the same reason, that means it’s also a terrible time to sell.
The larger uncertainties about the economy over the next six months has rattled the broader tech sector with may households names laying off thousands of workers. That is casting a long shadow over travel tech, too.
Business-to-business travel tech companies are generally doing well right now, but some experts expect the overall number of big mergers and acquisitions to decrease until the economy stabilizes.
There are still travel tech acquisitions happening right now, but the majority of companies looking to sell are the ones that really need to, said Chris Hemmeter, managing director of Thayer Ventures, a venture capital firm focused on the travel tech industry.
“I think people who can are going to hold, and then people who just can’t hold are going to have to enter a marketplace where the multiples are going to be much lower. I think that’s all going to net out less activity, not more,” Hemmeter said.
For companies with big growth goals, which startups like Mews backed by venture capital most always have, acquiring similar companies is a quicker way to do that. Mews provides a property management system for hotels. Its acquisitions have helped the company expand in Europe, where it’s had success in a very old industry that wants to modernize.
Matt Zito, a mergers and acquisitions broker for travel tech companies, said the startups that need to sell are those that have not started making revenue and therefore have fallen flat during the pandemic.
“I’m very selective with the ones that don’t really make any money or have no revenue,” Zito said. “There’s a lot of those out there. There’s a lot more than people think, let me tell you.”
Zito is managing partner of travel tech consultancy TSI, where he said he spends about 80 percent of his time on mergers and acquisitions for both buyers and sellers. That firm began Travel Startups Incubator in 2015, which invested in more than 20 startups.
He expects to see more “acqui-hires” during this time — when a company only acquires another’s employees, and the tech product is usually shelved. That’s often the case when an acquisition price is undisclosed, he said.
Another problem preventing acquisitions
When George Limbert began as president of Red Roof, he met with franchise operators of the hotel brand to better understand what was going well — and what was not.
Before the pandemic hit, hotels had spent roughly 2.5 percent of revenue on new technologies. The size of that investment dropped during the pandemic.
Red Roof, Motel 6, and Extended Stay have all implemented software to reduce the need for workers.
A U.S. hotel tech company with equity backing has acquired a booking engine based in Ireland.
Big Tech companies are laying off tens of thousands of people.
Skift kept an eye through much of 2022 on which travel tech startups raised money, documented in this weekly startup funding roundup.
Opinions vary widely about the state of investment in the travel tech startup world during this uncertain economic time, but one thing is for sure: it’s changing.
Verint provides customer service software to roughly 40 airline clients, among those other verticals. The Long Island, New York-based company is still gaining new airline business, but much of it is coming from existing customers.
The hotel tech startup Mews has raised $185 million, a number high above typical venture capital fundraises in that industry.
Much of the travel industry is continuing to recover after the pandemic and despite growing anxieties about the economy, with some metrics better than ever last year.
Cendyn, a software company that offers customer relationship management, digital marketing, and operations tools to hotels, has hired a new chief executive.
Southwest’s debacle late last year was extreme, but mass cancellations are not unheard of in the industry. Actually, they seem to be somewhat common.