Exclusive: FabHotels raises $20 Mn to scale new vertical TravelPlus

FabHotels’ parent Casa2 Stays has raised funding to the tune of $20 million from new and existing backers, sources aware of the development told Entrackr.

“Panthera led $20 million in Casa2 Stays [parent company for Fab Hotels] while existing investors also participated in this round,” said one of the sources. “The terms of the deal have been sealed and it’s in last-leg of closure.”

Panthera Growth Partners has backed several Indian startups such as BigBasket, Pepperfry, OfBusiness, and Zivame, among others.

According to sources, FabHotels has raised the funds to scale its new vertical TravelPlus. “The firm has raised a separate team [of about 120 employees] for the new vertical in the past few months,” said another source.

TravelPlus is a business travel and expense management platform. According to its website, it has tied up with more than 350 companies including Spinny, SpiceJet, Byju’s, Ninjacart, Zomato, and PolicyBazaar to provide solutions for hotel bookings across India.

TravelPlus appears to be a direct competitor to Matrix Partners-backed ITILITE while CRED-owned Happay in terms of expense management.

Queries sent to FabHotels on Friday did not elicit a response until the publication of the story. We’ll update the post in case they do.

FabHotels is yet to file FY23 numbers but it reported Rs 150 crore in revenue in FY22 against Rs 82 crore in FY21. It’s worth highlighting that the firm controlled its losses significantly to Rs 5.9 crore from Rs 20 crore in the previous year. FabHotels last raised around $3 million from Accel and Goldman Sachs in October 2020. It has raised over $50 million to date.

FabHotels’ direct competitor Treebo Hotels raised $16 million led by French hospitality giant Accor as a part of Series D round in June 2021.

Update at 6:20 PM IST: An earlier version of the story said that Panthera Capital had led the new round. However,  it's Panthera Growth Partners. We have updated the story with the correct details.