Strong growth: bookingkit secures seven-digit Series A funding

Booking software company bookingkit from Berlin raised a Series A financing round. Intermedia, an investment company of Media Union, which is one of the leading media groups in Germany, has joined the team of investors. In early 2015, Germany’s largest early-stage investor High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF) as well as business angel Robert Kabs from Hamburg already participated in a Seed round. Combined, these three partners now participate in a Series A funding with an seven-digit sum to further expand the company.

The market for tours and leisure activities is the third largest tourist market and has high potential for growth. bookingkit enables leisure providers to join the digital word with its software-as-a-service solution and also provides real-time availability of digital inventory for internet portals, marketplaces and travel agencies.

The Berlin based company has increased its customer base fivefold in the last twelve months in Germany, Austria and Switzerland and now with fresh capital will continue to expand even further. “Test winner bookingkit has experienced impressive development in the industry of leisure providers, a significant portion of which has yet to join the digital world. With its outstanding and marketer-neutral solution, the team has demonstrated that the technology appeals to an increasing customer base and that it is also quickly scalable. We are very happy to now have Intermedia on board as another strong partner, in order to accelerate growth and at the same time further develop bookingkit’s leading technology,” says Dr. Tanja Emmerling, Investment Manager at High-Tech Gründerfonds.

With the additional renowned investor, the two founders Christoph Kruse and Lukas C. C. Hempel have again proven the sustainability of their business model. “We draw on the strong growth generated during the seed round and are also able to demonstrate our technological advantage with our marketer-neutral solution, like be independent of marketplaces,” says founder Lukas C. C. Hempel.

“In just a short amount of time, bookingkit has written a real success story and revolutionized the software market of leisure providers. Now, the next chapter begins with more clout,” says angel investor Robert Kabs.

bookingkit is headquartered in Berlin and was founded by Christoph Kruse and Lukas C. C. Hempel in mid-2014. The startup enables activity providers in the leisure industry to digitize their business operations. The software developed by bookingkit allows a high degree of automation in managing a wide range of leisure activities and can be implemented in a provider’s website as a ready-to-use solution. bookingkit supports customers in a unique way with sales, marketing and processing their activities as well as in managing their company.

As a channel manager and technology platform, bookingkit also gives (online) travel agencies and marketplaces the opportunity to access a digitized inventory, allowing for automated booking of leisure activities in real time.

Further information and press material can be found at: www.bookingkit.de/presse

Press contact
BPRC GmbH & Co. KG
Matthias Burkard
Telephone: 089 – 171 000 606
presse@bookingkit.de

About High-Tech Gründerfonds
High-Tech Gründerfonds invests in young, high potential high-tech start-ups. The seed financing provided is designed to enable start-ups to take an idea through prototyping and to market launch. Typically, High-Tech Gründerfonds invests EUR 600,000 in the seed stage, with the potential for up to a total of EUR 2 million per portfolio company in follow-on financing. Investors in this public/private partnership include the Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy, the KfW Banking Group, as well as strategic corporate investors including ALTANA, BASF, Bayer, B. Braun, Robert Bosch, CEWE, Daimler, Deutsche Post DHL, Deutsche Telekom, Evonik, Lanxess, media + more venture Beteiligungs GmbH & Co. KG, METRO, Qiagen, RWE Innogy, SAP, Tengelmann and Carl Zeiss. High-Tech Gründerfonds has about EUR 576 million under management in two funds (EUR 272 million HTGF I, EUR 304 million HTGF II).

Contact:
High-Tech Gründerfonds Management GmbH
Dr. Tanja Emmerling
Tel: + 49 228 82300 – 100
info@high-tech-gruenderfonds.de
www.htgf.de