With an industry upended by the Covid-19 pandemic, travel startup TripGrid has spent the last nearly two years working closely with its users and signing on big customers. Based on that work, the startup secured another $1.6 million from existing investors to capitalize on an even bigger opportunity.
TripGrid created workflow automation software designed for large group travel. Think project and production-based users like entertainment, sports and media companies that have internal travel coordinators and must move lots of people. These are projects and trips that are core to customers' business and therefore are expected to recover. And they have to some degree as the pandemic has evolved.
This added funding is on top of $1.5 million raised in 2020, said CEO Jake Hoskins.
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“We went to customers and said, ‘what can we do on the other side of this to really change the game,’” Hoskins said, adding that the pandemic gave those typically busy customers the time to work closely with the TripGrid team to identify the tools they needed to do their jobs. He estimated the team has spent hundreds of hours working with these customers.
“We went through a huge process with customers and focused on the problems they have and that turns out to make the opportunity (for the startup) way bigger than we thought,” he said.
He couldn’t name names, but the startup has signed on Fortune 500 and Fortune 100 companies as customers. Later this year, it expects to unveil some major new features and capabilities for the product.
All of this is ahead of a full Series A raise that is planned for 2023, he said.
The TripGrid team is seven people, and the startup works with local contractors for elements such as design. Hoskins said that this year the headcount will likely grow as the company builds its product team.
The company’s backers include angels as well as Portland Seed Fund and Cascade Seed Fund.
