Travel Unicorn, Yanolja, Becomes the Largest Shareholder of ZEN Rooms, the No.1 Budget Hotel Chain in Southeast Asia
- The only travel unicorn, Yanolja in South Korea, additional investment in ZEN Rooms following its initial investment in the company back in July of last year…Securing more than 10,000 rooms in Southeast Asia
- ZEN Rooms grew by more than 400% in just one year after Yanolja's investment, firmly establishing itself as the No. 1 Budget Hotel Chain in the region
- Yanolja has become the first and the largest full-stack hospitality company in Southeast Asia
Oct 23, 2019, 09:00 ET
SEOUL, South Korea, Oct. 23, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Yanolja, the only travel unicorn in South Korea, becomes the largest shareholder of ZEN Rooms, the No. 1 budget hotel chain in Southeast Asia.
In July of last year, Yanolja has invested USD 15 million in ZEN Rooms. Such decision was based on the goal of creating large-scaled synergies with the company that offers integrated services ranging from online reservation management to offline operations via its self-developed platforms, unlike other hotel chains. Moreover, not only did ZEN Rooms has a similar business model to Yanolja, but it also was seen to have significant growth potential to become a leading full-stack hospitality company in the Southeast Asia. This investment involved global venture capital 'Access Ventures', which consists of investors specializing in Vietnam and other Southeast Asian regions.
Since Yanolja's first investment, ZEN Rooms' business has grown exponentially by more than 400 %, solidifying its status as the top-rated budget hotel chain in Southeast Asia. Established in 2015, ZEN Rooms is vertically integrated, combining online reservation, consumables management and offline hotel operations with a self-developed platform, operating in four major Southeast Asian countries, including: Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, and Singapore. As of now, ZEN Rooms is one of the largest hotel chains in Southeast Asia, with a total of more than 10,000 room inventory across the region. More particularly, ZEN Rooms is operating more than 4,500 rooms in the Philippines, a country where it has secured the title of being the largest hotel franchise across all segments.
Through ZEN Rooms' business, Yanolja has become the first and the largest full-stack hospitality company in Southeast Asia, running on its self-developed proprietary operating system and software platform, integrating the entire value chain. Its fully integrated and automated hotel management solution will enable ZEN Rooms to elevate customer satisfaction to a whole new level. Yanolja also plans to maximize synergy with its recently acquired eZee Technosys, the global top cloud-based PMS provider.
Nathan Boublil, co-founder and Managing Director of ZEN Rooms, comments: "We are honored to receive additional investment from Yanolja, the biggest hotel operation system provider in Asia and the No. 1 OTA in Korea. I believe ZEN Rooms, based on the investment, will be able to build a firm position as the largest full-stack hospitality company in the Southeast Asia. We will apply Yanolja's fully-integrated automated solution to our hotel operations to provide the best quality services to travelers."
Jongyoon Kim, CEO of Online Business at Yanolja, adds: "Since the first investment into ZEN Rooms, we have shared the same vision of operational excellence through fully integrated hotel automation solutions to fundamentally digitize the Southeast Asian hospitality market. In the last 12 months, the ZEN Rooms team has taken major steps to fulfill this vision and grown exponentially by over 400%. As we identified the growth potential of the Southeast Asian market, we will more proactively support ZEN Rooms and further solidify our status as the leading full-stack hospitality company in the global market beyond Southeast Asia".
About Yanolja
Yanolja is the largest and fastest-growing OTA, and the only 'Unicorn' among travel related companies in South Korea. Yanolja is one of Asia's largest companies, supplying an integrated platform by effectively utilizing IoT, AI and blockchain technologies. Yanolja is now also one of the global Top 2 cloud based PMS providers. Yanolja has integrated entire hotel operations, covering from front office to back office including housekeeping and maintenance. Moreover, Yanolja is one of the largest hotel franchise operators, managing more than 10,000 rooms in South Korea, as well as in Southeast Asia. In June of 2019, Yanolja raised $180M from leading global investment firm, GIC and the No.1 global OTA, Booking Holdings.
About ZEN Rooms
Founded in 2015 by entrepreneurs Kiren Tanna and Nathan Boublil, ZEN Rooms was established to improve the state of budget hospitality in Southeast Asia and is now one of the fastest growing travel groups in the region. ZEN currently has 10,000 rooms under both franchise and full management and a team of 450 staff across 4 countries: Singapore, Indonesia, Philippines and Malaysia. ZEN ranks as the leading hotel chain in the Philippines and among the top 3 in other countries of operation. ZEN is also behind ZEN Homes, the leading economy serviced apartment business. Since founding, ZEN has raised US$23M equity funding from Rocket Internet, Ooredoo Telecom, RedBadge Pacific, SBI Investments Korea, and Yanolja.
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