Becoming one of the fastest-growing hospitech companies in Europe, Amenitiz has successfully secured €6.5 million in seed funding in an investment round led by Point Nine.
Launched in 2018 by CEO Alexandre Guinefolleau, CRO Emmanuelle Guinefolleau and co-founder Frédéric Cadet, Amenitiz’s unique platform brings all the necessary tools and resources hoteliers need to run their own properties. From crafting beautiful and optimised websites, efficiently managing and distributing inventory, to automating daily tasks (including payment and invoicing), the startup offers an innovative solution for hoteliers.
This funding round is also supported by technology investors Backed and Otium Capital, as well as renowned business angels, including Avi Meier, Matt Robinson, and Carlos Gonzalez. Amenitiz was named on Wired’s 10 hottest Barcelona startups list in 2021, and has a vision to become the world’s leading hospitality platform. The funding secured by the young company will enable them to expand into new markets, and accelerate growth.
In the digital era, it’s essential for independent hoteliers to build their online presence, and provides one of the ways to compete against larger hotel and hospitality businesses that are increasingly dominating the market. Online Travel Agencies (OTA’s) used to represent a minority share of independent hotels’ bookings 10 years ago, however, between 2013 and 2019, their market share has grown by 50%. OTA’s now represent up to 71% of an independent hotel’s online bookings.
To counterbalance OTA’s domination, hotels have high incentives to enable direct bookings on their own website. While OTA’s have been able to invest heavily in creating seamless booking experiences on their platforms, it is often still a frustrating process on independent hotel websites, as they simply don’t have the resources to develop sophisticated and easy-to-use systems. The result is costing independent hoteliers thousands of euros in commissions and lost margins.
Amenitiz aims to disrupt the market through their complete operating system for independent hoteliers, B&Bs and cottages across Europe. Starting with developing an online presence, providing hoteliers with a website and channel manager, and then extending operations with an easy-to-use Property Management System (PMS) that hoteliers can use everyday to automate tasks such as invoices and payment processes.
As the young company grows, they plan to extend their offering to additional services such as revenue management. It’s all part of a mission to offer independent hoteliers services that were up until now only accessible to large hotels.
Amenitiz CEO Alexandre Guinefolleau said: “In this digital age, we believe running your hotel and developing a strong online presence should be as easy as booking a trip on Airbnb – if not easier. Unfortunately, as hoteliers become more and more reliant on online distribution, they often realise that their current tech stack -if any- is unnecessarily time-consuming, expensive and burdensome. We’re looking to change that by rebuilding the hotelier’s operating system and becoming a no-brainer for any hotelier in Europe.”
So far, Amenitiz has helped over 3000 properties in 28 different countries and now has a team of over 100. The young company was also able to grow 4-fold in 2020, one of the most challenging years for the hospitality and travel industries. This new funding injection will allow Amenitiz to triple the size of its team in the coming years helping them address strong demand in the French, Italian, and Spanish markets while augmenting their technology offering including a focus on payment and a strong partner ecosystem.
