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Lithuanian startup Eddy Travels gets acquired by global travel marketplace TripAdd

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Eddy Travels, a Lithuania-based AI travel assistant, has been acquired by New York-based ancillary travel product marketplace, TripAdd. The strategic deal reflects a move in the travel industry towards hyper-consumer-centric practices and collaboration between companies to achieve it. 

The travel industry has had an interesting few years to say the least. The industry, which is all about movement, has come through a global lockdown, and just experienced one of the busiest summers of travel ever seen. It’s an industry which has seen lots of exciting tech innovations recently with key trends being increased personalization for travellers and collaboration between companies. 

Reflecting the increasingly digital face of travel, AI startup Eddy Travels has been operating since 2019 to make planning trips simpler. It has now been acquired by TripAdd – the global digital marketplace for all things travel. 

Transaction details

American company TripAdd, which is part of the Blue Ribbon Bags group, has announced that the Eddy Travels team will join the firm to develop the marketplace further, and, to enhance the B2B Eddy AI chatbot services. 

While the exact figure of the transaction hasn’t been announced, it’s reported to be a multi-million euro deal. 

The Eddy Travels team will continue to operate from their offices in Vilnius, Lithuania, as they start a new phase of expansion. It’s being regarded as a strategic move for TripAdd as they expand on a global level. 

CEO of Eddy Travels, Edmundas Balčikonis: “TripAdd is growing in the global travel market and requires an automated omnichannel solution for marketing and sales operations. This is where our state-of-the-art AI chatbot solution will play a key role. TripAdd already uses an AI system for its recommendations which makes this acquisition a seamless transition for us as machine learning experts.”

Consumer-centric travel

Eddy Travels, who took part in the 2021 edition of the FutureTravel Summit’s Pitch Competition, is an AI travel assistant that finds the cheapest hotels and flights in seconds. Powered by machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI), Eddy Travel’s AI travel assistant is a fully automatic chatbot designed for websites, mobile apps, blogs, and social messaging applications.

The Vilnius-based team has raised about €1.5 million to date from TechStars, Practica Capita, Open Circle Capital and angel investors and has more than 400k users worldwide. It also provides white-label services for other businesses in the travel industry such as Visit Dubai, Lithuanian National Airports and others – a business function TripAdd want to expand on. 

TripAdd, a New York-based travel tech company offers a digital marketplace for all things travel. TripAdd sources thousands of offers from some of the world’s largest travel companies. Based on the customer’s trip details TripAdd selects the best product offers and combines them into personalized discounted travel bundles. Travel products such as tours, flight care, e-visa and much more are included in bundles. 

Using TripAdd, companies can add ancillary travel products to their platforms and generate extra revenue from selling personalized bundles to their customers. Scaling is the primary objective for TripAdd since the travel industry is experiencing a rebound after the pandemic.

Edmundas Balčikonis added: “This summer has shown that people are eager to travel abroad again since most have spent two years in their home countries. AI technology is a hot topic in the travel industry since legacy travel distribution systems are being upgraded to new generation technology, and TripAdd will be one of the leaders in the space.”

The next step for both companies is the launch of a TripAdd ancillary marketplace with a number of international online travel agencies. And the expansion of engineering and sales teams in Vilnius, Lithuania.

Edmundas Balčikonis: “The whole team is excited to join the TripAdd family. We have been collaborating with them for some time now with great results. With the growth back in the travel industry, the time is perfect for a merger. Both sides are eager to aid the travel industry recover faster.”

Gabriel Menkin, Co-founder and CEO at TripAdd, added: “At TripAdd, we were impressed with Eddy Travels’ team and technology from the first meeting. The technology talent pool in Lithuania is amazing, and we are especially keen to expand our R&D office in Vilnius.”

Travel is certainly an exciting industry at the moment and new trends and innovations, in part shaped by the pandemic and changing consumer perspectives, are pushing the sector forward. This year, you can join us in Barcelona for the 2022 edition of the FutureTravel Summittickets are now available – to discover more in a day of connection, exploration and inspiration. There will be another pitch competition taking place – and who knows what the future will bring for this year’s participants! 

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