Why we invested in Hundredrooms

By Carlos Vázquez, Investment Manager at Ad4Ventures Spain (Mediaset Group).

Ad4Ventures is the venture capital arm of Mediaset Group (leading free to air television broadcaster in Spain and Italy), focused on television media for equity deals. Ad4ventures has become the largest media for equity player in Southern Europe.

What is it?

Hundredrooms is a vacation rental metasearch that compares prices of properties from different sites speeding up the booking process. It includes main players: Airbnb, Booking, Tripadvisor, Homeaway, 9flats.

In 2016, vacation rental was already mature enough to experience the same game-changing process that previously happened on flights and hotels.

Why?

· Hot sector: funding activity signaled sector’s potential (like previously happened with Trivago, Kakak, Momondo, etc.). Need to group all market offer in one site that allows for real comparison

· Backed by relevant VC as Seaya Ventures, Inveready and A3M (M4E).

· Global ambition: founded to be a world reference in the sector.

· TV Fit: metasearch platforms are marketing tools to capture traffic and redistribute it in a sensible manner to the OTAs. Transaction margins are low (CPA or CPL), and so, user acquisition needs to be very low, something only achievable with established brand awareness, being top of mind, especially in the expensive travel business

· And of course, the TEAM, with strong experience in metasearch travel businesses (Kayak Spain and Portugal and eDreams) and clear understanding of the market dynamics. Superb!