LONDON—Fornova has closed a $17-million series B financing round to further accelerate the growth of its market intelligence and market visibility solutions for hotels worldwide. The Series B round was led by Deutsche Telekom Capital Partners (DTCP), with participation from Waypoint Capital and existing investor JAL Ventures.
More than 13,000 hotels have already adopted Fornova’s solutions, including brands such as Marriott, Hilton, NH Hotels and Premier Inn. Revenues have grown more than 100% in the past twelve months. Fornova now employs more than 115 professionals in five offices around the world.
Fornova’s CEO, Dori Stein, said, “The hotel industry is at an inflection point in its struggle to optimize online revenue and drive sales. In spite of the proliferation of new technologies and revenue solutions, hoteliers continue to overlook the fundamentally dynamic nature of the online marketplace. As a result, they are missing important insights on how their products are priced online, how to distribute them effectively and how to optimize the booking path to their advantage. Fornova’s patented technologies provide an unprecedented toolset to help hoteliers turn the tide in their favor, succeeding in this dynamic and fast-changing marketplace.”
According to the company, Fornova’s technologies for scanning, extracting and analyzing massive amounts of information from the online marketplace provide a two-tiered solution: Its market intelligence product allows hotels to collect and analyse all the available information from the market, to better understand how their hotels are priced, ranked and presented on the different online marketing channels; Its channeling and market visibility product translates the data analysis into actions, which have direct effect on the bottom line, reflected in occupancy and direct brand.com sales.
Thomas Preuss, partner at DTCP, said, “We see a strong demand for a transparent and powerful business intelligence tool from all actors in the market. Proprietary data and comprehensive coverage of all sales channels are crucial determination factors in the increasingly competitive hospitality market.”
Fornova will use the new investment to grow sales, marketing and productization worldwide, and make its data even more actionable.