Business travel finally easy to book and manage! That promises the Berlin startup Comtravo. Thanks to state-of-the-art technology, the platform simplifies the booking, management and billing of business travel. Entrepreneurs, team assistants or secretaries can book a complete business trip with just one text message using innovative technology.
And this is how it works: Customers can formulate their booking request in text form via e-mail, SMS, Skype or via company-specific chats (eg: “I need flights Berlin – Vienna” Monday through Friday evening).
With an e-mail the planned business trip is booked in a few seconds. The Comtravo software converts the request by “Natural Language Processing” (NLP) into structured data. The software offers customers only up to four precise booking options per request, which not only result from all preferences stored, but also from previous bookings and similar requests.
With its algorithm, the system also ensures that the best options in terms of time and price are offered. Trained travel experts train the software and in all cases – also manually – ensure the advantageous optimization of business travel for the customer.
Rebooking or cancellations are possible. Also for a message is sufficient. Transparent invoicing at the end of the month as well as a free emergency hotline around the clock are also part of Comtravo’s service. The service costs between 7 and 15 euros per booking including access to negotiated rates, hotline, an illustration of travel policies and the like.
Book trips without annoying input masks
The target group for the new booking platform is the classic middle class, which accounts for two-thirds of the global business travel market, but is still very neglected by traditional travel management companies.
The Berlin-based company offers these SME customers a fast-to-implement and cost-effective solution for business travel – from simple booking to billing – from a single source. The startup company combines the service of a classic travel agency with the efficiency of online tools.
In the last two years, the technology has been developed so far that more than 35 percent of requests can be processed automatically.
“It does not make sense for trained travel merchants to take care of simple standard requests, as is the case in many classic travel agencies. We’ve developed our technology so far that on average, our employees only spend a third of the time that would otherwise be required in a manual process.
Instead of clicking through annoying input masks, the secretary can also forward the mail request from the boss, “says CEO Michael Riegel. “At the same time, Comtravo can bundle the demand of many individual small enterprises and medium-sized enterprises and negotiate thus better conditions for its customers like a purchase association.”
Comtravo was founded in July 2015 by Michael Riegel, Jannik Neumann, Marko Schilde and Slobodan Utvic as well as an experienced team from the travel and internet industry. Meanwhile, the thriving startup employs 45 people, with half of the team working on the technology and on the product.
More than 200 medium-sized companies from Germany already use Comtravo’s new technology.
The startup will be supported by “top-notch” technology investors (e.g., Creandum) and extremely successful travel originators, such as Trivago, Ratetiger, Momondo, Airbnb supported.
Also published on Medium.