Planning Your Vacation? This Online Platform Can Book Tours …

Established in 2014 by travel industry veteran Ming Chen, KKday currently has offices in 11 Asian countries, including the Philippines

A 2016 survey released by credit card payments firm Visa revealed that in 2015, Filipinos spent $9.9 billion (Php450.5 billion) on overseas travel, ranking it 25th among the 50 countries included in the survey. It added that by 2025, this will almost double to $17.7 billion, indicating that the demand for travel is on a growth trajectory that many businesses can take advantage of.

One of these businesses is KKday, a Taiwanese startup that operates a travel booking platform. But instead of plane tickets or hotel reservations, travelers can use KKday to book tours and experiences in over 80 countries.

“With such a large market, KKday has already implemented an effective globalized strategy by providing high-quality and affordable experiences to travelers from across the world,” the company wrote in a press release dated February 22.

KKday’s platform currently hosts over 10,000 experiences across 500 cities, which can be viewed and purchased similar to goods in an e-commerce site. Its experience-focused strategy has proven to be effective so far, as the startup revealed that its website gets over four million unique visitors and “serves a few hundred thousand travelers” every month.

Its traction has been noticed by several investors, most recently by Japanese travel firm H.I.S. In the press release, KKday revealed that it has forged an alliance with H.I.S. and secured $10.5 million in funding in the process. One of the startup’s existing investors, Hong-Kong based venture capital firm MindWorks Ventures, also participated in the Series B funding round.

“The alliance and funding is expected to help KKday expand its regional presence and further improve its variety of affordable product offerings to travelers,” the company wrote. “In addition to growing its operations across Asia, KKday will further improve its position in China as well as expand into the Asia travel segment of both US and European travelers.”

Established in 2014 by travel industry veteran Ming Chen, KKday currently has offices in 11 Asian countries, including the Philippines, and employs over 280 people.

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Lorenzo Kyle Subido is a staff writer of Entrepreneur PH