INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Mapify, the Berlin startup that offers what it describes as a &social travel network,& has raised $1 million in seed funding from a mixture
and Europe-based funds and angel investors.They include Switzerland Ennea VC (led by Jan Valentin, who served as Senior Vice President at
Kayak in Europe), Roland Grenke (co-founder of Dubsmash), Navid Hadzaad Javaherian (former founder and CEO at GoButler ​and
​Product Leader at Amazon Alexa), L.A.-based LayJax Ventures​ (the investment vehicle of Pheed co-founder Phil Haus​ and
actor Zach Avery), Niv Dror​ (previously of Product Hunt ​and AngelList​), and Lucas von Cranach​ (CEO of
OneFootball).The company had previously received investment from MIT Sandbox Innovation Fund​, Gunnar Froh (who launched Airbnb
international expansion), Fredrik Posse​ (Partnerships Manager at Spotify), and Hagen Angermann​ (former Senior Manager at
Daimler in Asia).
Launched in November 2017 — and a finalist in TechCrunch Battlefield​ — Mapify is a social travel app that lets
you &visualize, find and plan& individual travel experiences
You can visually document past and current travel experiences, including photos, descriptions and other details, either related to an
individual experience or entire trip
You can also connect with other travellers via a follow function and the ability to comment on places shared or by collaborating on
&collections&.In addition — in classic social media style — the Mapify app features a location-focused feed, which pushes personal
recommendations based on travel interests as understood by the platform
You can search for countries, regions and cities on Mapify to discover spots to save to your private lists of planned trips.&The global
travel market and especially its planning and booking process is fragmented,& Mapify co-founder and CEO Patrick Häde tells TechCrunch
&People are using dozens of different sources for inspiration or planning and end up sharing Google docs with friends to create some kind of
We have designed an app unifying the travel space by pulling together inspiration, sharing and planning into a seamless mobile-first
platform that is based on a social network of travelers around the globe
We are designing Mapify to be social because we believe the future of travel lies in unique and personal recommendations from friends and
influencers&.To that end, Mapify is currently most popular amongst millennials, especially those who travel frequently
&As some call it the ‘Instagram of Travel&, the platform has grown virally through re-sharings on Instagram and by word-of-mouth,& Häde
says.Rather confusingly, Instagram might also be seen as a competitor, as it too can be used for travel inspiration
However, the Mapify co-founder says Instagram data structure is not well-suited for a travel planning process (e.g
Another more obvious competitor is TripAdvisor, but it doesn&t offer personalised travel feeds, making it less efficient to
navigate.Meanwhile, Mapify currently generates revenue through in-depth partnerships with travel companies such as Airbnb
&By combining different travel services in one single mobile platform, we have seen increasing interest amongst the top players in the
travel industry to become part of the Mapify platform,& adds Häde.
