Where are they now? Catching up with the Hot 25 Travel Startups for 2024

It’s been a year since PhocusWire named its Hot 25 Travel Startups for 2024, sponsored by Allianz Partners U.S.

As we gear up to announce our class of 2025 startups, we have been checking in with all of the past classes of Hot 25 Travel Startups from 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 and now 2024. 

We asked the founders to tell us two things – their companies’ highlights of 2024 and their priorities for 2025. We heard back from 14 of the companies. Responses have been edited for brevity.

Acai

Acai uses artificial intelligence to enhance customer service agent performance and transform travel operations. Responses from Jeanne Kim.

2024 highlights: 2024 was a big growth year for Acai. We raised $4 million from Nauta Capital, our lead investor, DraperB1 and One Travel and brought on new clients including Kiwi.com, Lastminute.com, World Travel Inc., Goway and Globespan. Our team has expanded to 12 people, including the recent hire of industry veteran Ron Glickman as our head of sales in New York City and Nathalie Lylock (ex-AmexGBT) as head of customer experience. Our talented development and product teams continue to grow in Barcelona, one of the best travel tech hubs in the world. From a product perspective, our suite of AI products grows more impressive every day: the Agent AI Helper that empowers agents to provide faster, more accurate assistance; Control Tower and Routing that ensures emails are routed to the most suitable agents and provides visibility into the process; Email Automation that speeds up agent actions with summarization, suggestion and auto replies capabilities; and Customer Service Intelligence, which acts as the AI business analyst that gathers feedback for targeted improvements.

2025 priorities: Next year, we’ll be expanding our client base in the online travel agency and travel management company segments and will release new products — such as call automation and global distribution system overlay in natural language — to continue optimizing travel operations globally.

Autoura

Autoura operates personalized hospitality and tourism experiences using AI tour guides and autonomous vehicles. Responses from founder and CEO Alex Bainbridge:

2024 highlights: I started working on how to operate hospitality and tourism experiences using AI in 2018. Back then I would speak to a small crowd of semi-interested people. A 2024 highlight was the dawning realization that AI is now a serious travel industry topic and we have positioned ourselves well for the coming years with our multi-year head start. 

2025 priorities: Deliver personalization at scale using decentralized technology, such as decentralized digital identities. Innovate our consumer facing AI agent technology to a point that consumers consider it useful (rather than bleeding edge). Demonstrate to non-believers that the best approach to scale the operation of AI designed experiences is to use AI tour guides and autonomous vehicles. 

Boddy

Boddy bridges travel and wellness through technology, making health experiences accessible to everyone everywhere. Responses from co-founder and CEO Hannes Boller:

2024 highlights: In 2024, Boddy has achieved significant milestones, highlighted by strategic partnerships with industry leaders such as LiveWell by Zurich Insurance, a wellbeing platform that connects their many clients to our wellness experiences worldwide. Additionally, Boddy has just formed a multi-year strategic partnership with DragonPass, a global leader in travel and lifestyle benefits for over 40 million customers. This strategic partnership will enable DragonPass’ corporate clients, including payment networks, global banks, insurers, airports and telecom providers, to enrich their customers’ travel experience with exclusive access to Boddy’s global network of health clubs. Lastly, Boddy secured another funding round from existing and new investors, enabling further investments in technology and expanding its partner network globally.

2025 priorities: In the coming 12-18 months our key focus will be the global scale-up of our venture, including the expansion and diversification of our network of fitness and wellness partners worldwide. In the past three years, we have built a solid network of health partners across North America, Europe and Southeast Asia. As we are now entering a period of strong growth, especially on the back of the above partnerships, we are now expanding in new key markets such as Latin America, the Middle East and new parts of Asia. Key to success will be maintaining a healthy balance between speed and cost, while safeguarding a sound company culture as we are growing our workforce significantly.

BTP Automation

BTP Automation is an SaaS enterprise solution for automating the corporate hotel sourcing process using real-time, actionable data. Responses from co-founder, chief revenue officer and head of marketing Annette Cumming:

2024 highlights: Our key highlight from 2024 is our integration with SAP Concur. This first-of-its-kind innovation further enhances our market position, providing greater visibility for corporate travel programs to leverage hotel room nights no matter where they are booked. We are focusing on growth with direct customers while remaining fully committed to supporting our valued travel management company customers, ensuring strong partnerships across both channels. We continue to focus on refining our collaboration with our hotel partners and delivering even greater value to our customers.

2025 priorities: As we move forward, our focus remains on innovation and scaling our operations to capitalize on new opportunities.

Dharma

Dharma plans and sells travel experiences hosted by the world’s most inspiring people and brands. Responses from CEO Charaf El Mansouri: 

2024 highlights: We launched matchday trips hosted by 12 football legends including Eric Cantona, Javier Zanetti, Marco Materazzi and David Villa. In addition, we relaunched our marketplace, with 100+ trips hosted by the world’s most inspiring people and brands. We’re also on track for 2x/2.5x growth year over year.

2025 priorities: Go deeper in the three verticals we are taking a big position on: wellness, sports, music and entertainment, focus primarily on the US as a market and scale our value proposition through our SaaS product, the Dharma Studio.

Direx

Direx provides an all-in-one solution for attractions, tours and activities. Responses from co-founder and CEO Ibukunoluwa Salau:

2024 highlights: We completely revamped our product and launched it after a brief hiatus in 2023. Our sales team hit the ground running, and we’re thrilled to have successfully piloted with customers. It’s not just our product that grew – our fantastic team expanded too, bringing fresh talent beyond our founders. We were also selected as one of the top 30 high-potential startups and enterprising youth across Kenya, Nigeria, Uganda, Sénégal and Morocco, in the prestigious AFRISE Challenge 2024.

2025 priorities: As we look ahead to 2025, our company focuses on three key areas to grow and improve. First, we want to use AI technology to improve our products’ performance for our customers. Second, we’re closely examining all our products to ensure we’re offering the most useful ones. Lastly, we plan to expand Direx to new markets. By doing these things, we hope to stay ahead in our industry and create a brighter future for both our company and the people who use our products. We’re excited about these goals and believe they will help us serve our customers better in the coming years.

Grazzy

Grazzy gets frontline service employees more money, more often with digital tips. Responses from director of marketing Matt Isaacs:

2024 highlights: 2024 marked several exciting milestones for Grazzy. The platform became the first digital tipping solution to earn approval status by all four major hotel brands (Marriott, Hyatt, Hilton and IHG), signaling a desire for key hospitality players to integrate a cashless tipping option to enable guests and celebrate their teams. Grazzy also announced in July 2024 a seed round of $4 million from several investing partners, both established and new. And of course, we received the honor of being named a PhocusWire Hot 25 Travel Startup for 2024!

2025 priorities: We are accelerating new customer onboarding to help hotels and hotel operators large and small launch digital tipping programs faster, and we are bringing digital tipping to new service industry sectors. Grazzy is looking forward to expanding our team with new hires in sales, customer success and operations roles. We’ve been building exciting partnerships through 2024 that will help Grazzy users earn, save and spend with digital tipping in new ways. Grazzy will continue the exponential growth we’ve enjoyed since our launch!

Greether

Greether empowers women to explore safely with local expert female greeter guides. Responses from public relations and communications lead Estephani Espindola:

2024 highlights: This year, Greether has continued to make a powerful impact on the travel industry and female empowerment. One of the key achievements of 2024 was securing an investment from Andreessen Horowitz as part of the prestigious a16z TxO Spring 2024 cohort, a pivotal milestone that will help propel the company’s growth and innovation forward. Greether provided personalized and safe travel experiences for women across 40 countries and 80 cities, with its community now spanning over 100 countries and 1,000+ cities worldwide. This year, we also kicked off essential travel partnerships with key travel agencies, allowing us to offer secure, curated experiences to more female travelers. Additionally, we expanded our B2B partnerships with destination boards, such as Visit Tulum, offering female travel assessments and certifications to help make destinations safer and more inclusive for women travelers. The partnership with JourneyWoman, launched this year, focuses on providing tailored travel experiences for women over 50, further extending Greether’s mission of empowering women through travel.

2025 priorities: In 2025, Greether will focus on expanding its global network of Greeters, particularly in areas where we have seen the greatest interest from travelers. Our goal is to grow our community of local female guides in these high-demand destinations, ensuring that travelers can access trusted, local expertise wherever they go. We will continue to build out our B2B pipeline, working closely with strategic brands, destination boards and tourism organizations to offer our Female Travel Assessment Certifications and create safer, more inclusive travel environments. Additionally, the partnership with JourneyWoman will continue to evolve, enhancing travel options for women over 50 and ensuring that our services meet the diverse needs of all female travelers. As part of our ongoing innovation, we will also be beta testing a new product in 2025 to further enhance the platform’s capabilities and user experience. Our active fundraising efforts are aimed at accelerating this technological development, scaling Greether’s global impact, and promoting female empowerment, sustainable tourism and economic inclusion. Supporting local female entrepreneurs through training and economic opportunities remains central to our mission. As we grow, Greether remains committed to making travel safer and more empowering for women around the world.

Katanox

Katanox is a platform that unifies direct contracting and financial infrastructure for hospitality distribution. Responses from marketing lead Joseph Vito DeLuca:

2024 highlights: In 2024 Katanox achieved many milestones which include: Securing our PSD2 license to offer regulated payment services and launch our direct bank transfer B2B payments product and securing our money services business license in the United States; onboarding and scaling several buyers including some of the world’s biggest, such as Navan and Hopper; and onboarding a number of global hotel chains such as Hilton on top of two of the biggest global chains worldwide to be announced at a later date; increased gross merchandise value by several hundred multiples and launched London and New York hubs to further our expansion into the U.S. and U.K. markets and better service our global customer base. We also released our accounting and payments product and seeing quick adoption by the market and welcomed one of the largest and most respected US venture capital firms as a major investor.

2025 priorities: To continue onboarding the largest global hotel chains, onboard additional blue chip buyers and scale our direct bank transfer B2B payments product in the United States and United Kingdom. We plan to grow our team, both on the commercial and product side and to scale our product and further our expansion into several markets. 

Legends

Legends transforms travelers’ digital footprints into preference profiles and insights to help brands personalize while managing privacy. Responses from co-founder and CEO Stephanie Daniel:

2024 highlights: From a strategy and go-to-market perspective we delivered on implementing our “TravelDNA” technology as a B2B SaaS solution. From a product perspective we expanded our data input sources from photos to calendar and more, further enhanced our database and leveraged AI. We also expanded our method of delivery for B2B partners to include API and white label with both app and web based solutions. From an overall corporate perspective we expanded our legendary group of investors and advisors across travel, data and beyond. 

2025 priorities: We are focused on expanding our strategic B2B customers across key sectors and including large enterprise – we love to partner with innovative brands and thought leaders in the industry. Sector focus includes travel advisor networks, hotels, loyalty programs, tech providers and OTAs/ecommerce. We will continue to evolve the product to deliver the best possible impact and experience for both brands and travelers and are focused on proving value through core KPIs and business outcomes. We will also selectively be expanding our team and partners to deliver on roadmap and impact.

Point.me

Point.me is a points and travel reward search platform that increases the spending power for millions by making it easier to discover and book high value travel with rewards points. Co-founder and CEO Adam Morvitz:

2024 highlights: Point.me took 2023 traction to new heights in 2024, with first of their kind enterprise partnerships including American Express and Soho House, the launch of a brand new travel discovery feature dubbed “Explore,” as well as closing a $15 million Series B fundraise lead by Citi Ventures and Nyca with support from Samsung Next and Brian Kelly (The Points Guy). Through the Amex partnership, all U.S. based cardholders with a Amex Membership Rewards Points earning card, such as the Amex Green, Amex Gold or Amex Platinum are now able to enjoy a complimentary white-labeled version of Point.me search to maximize their points. This revolutionary partnership allows Amex cardholders to find their perfect flight using points, often in better cabins than ever imagined, for fewer points. Point.me demystifies American Express’ network of airline transfer partners, pulling real time points pricing into one simple and easy place to find the optimal reward flight. The introduction of our Explore feature also represents a significant leap forward in Point.me mission. It not only helps consumers find great opportunities to travel with their rewards points but also fundamentally changes how people perceive and use their points. Customers can simply search by themes, such as “food & wine,” “beach,” “winter sports,” by region or by date to find all the reward flight opportunities that exist when they would like to travel. Someone could say “beach in February” and Point.me. Explore will show all the ways to use points for great flights to a beach in February, globally, with just one search. By making it easier to discover and book high-value award travel, Explore effectively increases the spending power of users, turning their points into a more versatile and valuable currency for global exploration with better conversion.

2025 priorities: Recognition from financial services partners including Bilt Rewards in 2023 and American Express in 2024 indicate how the Point.me travel rewards solution is driving traction and engagement with consumers while adding long overdue satisfaction to the world of rewards, as well as share of wallet for those playing well. Customers prioritize spending on cards that offer meaningful rewards. We’ll work diligently in 2025 to build meaningful partnerships and features which inspire confidence and participation and without a doubt, some phenomenal trips!

The Host Co connects hotel-level amenities to short-term rentals, from spa and chef to late checkout, gratuity, on-site rentals and more. Responses from co-founder and CEO Annie Sloan:

2024 highlights: We are growing fast:13% month over month profit growth, more than 10,000 doors and users in 13 countries. The Host Co is officially profitable. Hosts and property managers have led our big product launches this year: gratuity, co-hosting, gifting of services and vouchers to gift weekend stays. Our vendor team now has more than 6,000 local services, ranging from private chef to wellness services, party decor, event rentals, transportation… even a big foot experience!

2025 priorities: Our number one priority is multiple currencies. We have users in 13 countries now despite only operating in U.S. dollars. 16% of our demo attendees are outside of the U.S., despite us doing zero international marketing. This is a great signal that we are headed in the right direction. Our second priority: expanding features for enterprise users. This includes sophisticated accounting dashboards, complete white-label for boutique hotels and embedded communications.

Travlr ID

Travlr ID powers the future of travel profiles today. Responses from founder and CEO Gee Mann:

2024 highlights: For Travlr ID 2024 has been a year of advancing the technology build and features of our travel profile platform alongside customer deployments, we have been working hard towards our SOC2 and ISO accreditations. We have held numerous customer forums to gather the needs of our customers whilst creating valuable partnerships with companies such as Riskline, Umbrella and Amadeus. The industry shift towards corporate and travelers owning the profile is in full motion with it unlocking many uses cases that travel managers were unable to deliver to with current set ups.

2025 priorities: For 2025 Travlr ID will be adding new features to our platform and continue to advance our ecosystem partnerships. We will be launching our anticipated AI agent infrastructure that will enable greater personalization of profiles. The team will grow as we announce funding in early Q1. We look forward to attending many industry events and sharing the stage on various panels about connected ecosystems and the importance of a portable travel profile owned by the traveler and of course powering the NorthStar of a connected trip.

Turneo

Turneo is a software platform that helps hotels digitize sales of in-house and local experiences. Responses from co-founder and CEO Matija Marijan:

2024 highlights: We have grown the volume of bookings on the platform more six times compared to 2023 and expanded the product range from a tool for hotels to sell local experiences, to a full-fledged platform for selling hotels to sell and manage any kind of travel activity that is not rooms. Just recently, we secured seed financing round from two top funds: Bessemer Venture Partners and Underline Ventures 

2025 priorities: We have many exciting launches in the works with leading hotel groups across Europe and wider. Our priority is to help our customers, hotel groups, launch on the product successfully so they can deliver amazing experiences to their guests. On top of that, we’re continuing with innovation in AI and e-commerce tools to make it even easier for guests of hotels to have an amazing stay filled with experiences.