19 Jun 2018

Peek pockets $23 million in funding, forms partnership for direct bookings with Google

Peek, the tours and activities platform, has announced a $23 million Series B round of funding.

The round was led by Cathay Innovation but also includes the participation of Kayak co-founder Paul English (now Lola) among others. Existing investors also participated according to a statement.

Cathay Innovation’s founder Denis Barrier will join Peek’s board.

US-based Peek provides software enabling activities operators to take bookings online while also offering the inventory to consumers via the Peek website and mobile app.

The funding, which brings the total raised to $40 million, is interesting in light of the recent acquisitions of tours and activities tech companies FareHarbor by Booking Holdings and Bokun by TripAdvisor.

At the recent EyeforTravel Europe conference Booking Holdings senior vice president of corporate development Todd Henrich said the company looks less for large acquisitions these days, leaning more towards “tuck-in” opportunities of a few million.

What’s more intriguing is Peek’s partnership with Reserve with Google enabling customers to instantly book thousands of activities from within Google Search, Maps and Google Trips.

There have been various rumblings about Google’s strategy for tours and activities with its Area 120 experimental workshop seeking Paris-based guides to help it earlier this year.

Then there’s its Trips app which acts as a personalised tour guide by suggesting activities according to time, weather, ratings from other Google users and past behaviour.

Late last year Google said it was extending its Reserve service outside of the US.

Cathay Innovation’s Barrier says:

“Peek has established an early leadership position in the $150 billion activities industry with the best product and rapidly growing scale.”

Just over a year ago Peek acquired ailing rival Zozi with terms of the deal undisclosed.

Related reading:

GetYourGuide to run its own branded tours

Peek raises $10 million in new financing