Omio (née GoEuro) has acquired multimodal travel veteran Rome2rio as it works on building out a global travel aggregator business, having taken the decision to zoom out from its home market of Europe earlier this year.
Financial details of the transaction are not being disclosed. But Omio raised a $150 million funding round a year ago, so it’s presumably splashing a portion of that capital now.
It’s not Omio’s first acquisition (others have included BusRadar for beefing up its bus search capabilities). But it looks to be the first with its eye on a broader global business horizon.
Rome2rio is based in Melbourne, Australia, and offers search tools for travelers covering multiple transportation options all around the world.
Some 10 million locations are covered by its product, which serves results for more than 5,000 train, bus, flight, ferry and intra-city public transportation operators.
The 2010 founded startup has some 18 million users per month. It had only raised a very small amount of VC over nearly a decade of operations, per Crunchbase.
Omio says it will maintain Rome2rio as a separate brand, so the company will be operating two travel aggregator brands going forward. The companies will collaborate to “create new and better experiences” for global travelers by combining Rome2rio’s end-to-end journey planning offer with the extensive transport inventory that’s bookable via Omio, it adds.
Commenting in a statement, Naren Shaam, CEO and founder of Omio, said: “We are excited to welcome the Rome2rio team to Omio. They have built a great product with innovative tech and delivered impressive growth. Together, our two brands will reach half a billion users every year and offer access to thousands of transportation operators globally, helping us deliver our vision to solve consumer travel globally.”
“Joining forces with Omio is a natural extension of our existing product experience,” added Dr. Michael Cameron, CEO and co-founder of Rome2rio, in another statement. “We have spent almost a decade refining our ability to help users figure out how to get from one corner of the globe to another. Now, with Omio, Rome2rio customers will be able to book tickets with more transport providers than ever before, and receive support throughout their journey.
“Rome2rio and Omio share a vision of creating simple, intuitive multi-modal transport products for our users. As a team, we are excited about the opportunity to work with Omio, integrate our technologies and leverage each other’s expertise to scale even more quickly.”
Further acquisitions look to be on the cards for Omio, which says it will look to buy its way into new geographies — as well as seeking to grow organically and via partnering with more transport providers.
Currently the 2013-founded travel business has an average of 27 million monthly users. It also says it has 18 million app downloads to date, as well as more than 800 partnerships with transportation providers.
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