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Below is our recent interview with Dustin Figge, Co-Founder and Managing Director at Homelike:
Q: For those who have never heard of it, how would you describe Homelike?
A: Homelike is the leading B2B marketplace for long-term furnished business apartment rentals starting from 30 nights in Europe. With our online booking process, we enable our clients to book fully-furnished premium-quality apartments as easily as hotel rooms.
Today, we are working with more than 15,000 corporate clients across the globe, including Capgemini and Thoughtworks, and ranging from small startups to large multinational corporations in various industries and locations and enable them to save up to 60% of the costs compared to hotel rates. Currently, Homelike’s portfolio includes 45,000 serviced and business apartments in 100+ cities in four countries that offer expatriates and business travelers a “home away from home”.
Homelike partners with a network of professional apartment suppliers, tapping into their portfolios to offer units that meet strict quality criteria and are specifically tailored to the needs of business travelers. An integrated unit management system allows suppliers to easily track bookings, invoices, rental agreements, and unit performance.
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Q: What is your main goal at the moment?
A: Our current focus is expanding our business internationally. Business travel is a global industry and we are constantly increasing our geographical footprint in order to better serve the global demand of our customers. This includes expanding to further markets but also launching our online platform in more languages to improve the user experience for all of those who are not fluent in English, German, or Spanish. With the launch of our Spanish website earlier this year, we already expanded our potential customer base by more than 477 million native speakers world-wide.
Q: You have recently raised $14M, could you tell us more about your recent funding round?
A: The funding round was led by Spark Capital with participation of Homelike’s existing investors. Spark Capital is a top global investor which has previously invested in various successful startups, such as Twitter, Oculus and Slack. We are excited to work with them to continue growing the best platform for temporary business apartment rentals in the market.
We will use the investment to scale our business, improve the technology and the product behind Homelike in order to strengthen our leading market position. We currently employ 85 people and we are hiring in all areas, especially in tech and product. Furthermore, we will invest in the expansion of our apartment portfolio.
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Q: How do people typically discover or become aware of your services?
A: Various online marketing channels as well as a global Key Account Management team are important parts of our marketing and sales initiatives. I think personal relationships in the business travel segment are very important and it’s great that a lot of large multi-national companies, such as Thoughtworks and Capgemini, already trust us with their long-term business travel accommodation.
Q: What can we expect from Homelike in the future? What are your plans?
A: As a global tech company, we are leveraging the latest technology to serve the corporate housing and long-term business travel accommodation needs of B2B clients world-wide.
We already provide our customers with a best-in-class booking experience and the “home away from home”-feeling. Considering that tech solutions in the hotel industry are about 10-15 years ahead, there are still many product functionalities we want to add in order to help corporates with managing and booking long-term accommodations in the most convenient way.
Last Updated on November 11, 2018
