Withlocals continues to attract investors after securing a €2.5m grant from the European Innovation Council's pilot SME Instrument back in 2015. This time the company raised €8m on a Series B round led by London-based Keen Venture Partners with participation from existing investor Inkef Capital.
Withlocals is a Dutch scale-up marketplace that connects tens of thousands of travelers each month with verified local hosts in over 30 cities across Europe and Asia offering personalized private tours and activities at scale based on travelers passions like food, music and sports.
“The tours and activities segment is booming. Withlocals offers a welcome alternative to standard tours and skip-the-line tickets with personalized and unique experiences. This new round of funding will help us to connect more people and cultures, to offer a broader and more localized range of experiences and to build a strong community of hosts worldwide.”, explained Withlocals’ CEO Matthijs Keij.
Robert Verwaayen, General Partner at Keen highlighted: “We believe Withlocals is tapping into a large latent demand of “experiential depth” for traveling that breaks away from the cookie-cutter mould of holiday offerings. With great momentum the company is able to pull off a paradox: delivering uniquely personal experiences at scale.”
The new funding will be used to offer end-to-end localization, strengthen the community of local hosts, continue the growth in existing and new cities and offer more experiences based on people’s passions.
View Withlocals's information on the EIC SME Instrument data hub.
DISCLAIMER: This information is provided in the interest of knowledge sharing and should not be interpreted as the official view of the European Commission, or any other organisation.