SEOUL, South Korea (Reuters) – Yanolja, a South Korean travel and leisure company, announced on Thursday that SoftBank’s Vision Fund has invested $1.7 billion in the company as it tries to capitalize on significant pandemic-induced expansion across Southeast Asia, India, and Africa. The proliferation of COVID-19 has put firms under strong pressure to deliver contactless services and decrease costs, according to Yanolja, which provides cloud-based booking and other solutions for hotels and travel companies. As a result, Yanolja has become a rare beast in the travel sector during the last year, a company with increased earnings. “We believe Yanolja is a pioneer in revolutionizing the travel and leisure business in South Korea, thanks to artificial intelligence,” said Greg Moon, Managing Partner at SoftBank Investment Advisers. Yanolja would not comment on the share Vision Fund is receiving or the investment’s valuation. However, the purchase is believed to be worth far more than its previous $180 million estimate in 2019, when Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC and US firm Booking Holdings invested $180 million. Yanolja was founded in 2005 as an online booking agency, however its cloud business was first started in 2019. In an interview with Reuters, Chief Executive Kim Jong-yoon said the company, which competes with Oracle Corp in a highly fragmented field, presently has about 30,000 licensees and expects to reach 500,000 by 2025. “When the COVID-19 travel restrictions are lifted, our sales and profitability will undoubtedly grow,” he said. Yanolja turned a 16.1 billion won ($14 million) operating profit last year, up from a deficit of 6.2 billion won the year before, while revenue increased by 44 percent to 192 billion won. Yanolja has previously stated that it plans to go public, but Kim has refused to comment on those plans. Hotels may use the company’s technologies to manage bookings, accept contactless check-ins, and track when visitors are not in their rooms to avoid wasting electricity and cleaning rooms more efficiently. It also provides solutions that make it easier for hotels and travel firms to integrate their data. Yanolja has signed up 6,000 hotels in Southeast Asia, where it has a presence in Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, and the Philippines, in addition to 9,000 hotels in South Korea. It also hopes to reach Vietnam soon, thanks to a partnership with VNTravel, VNLIFE’s online travel division. Yanolja has 6,000 hotel customers in India, and at least 3,000 hotels use its services in Africa since it launched in September of last year./n
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