Back in 1999, Stephen Ekbergh founded Travelstart in Sweden. He then moved his business to Cape Town because, well, it’s like so cool here, obviously. Today, Travelstart has a presence in more that 16 countries and is hoping to expand with a recent injection of cash monies it received from a UK-based tech investment company.

Amadeus Capital Partners basically just dropped $40 million (R648m) into the pockets of the online travel booking website in the hopes to help Travelstart expand into more regions of Africa.

Basically, what we want to try and do now is solidify our market leadership in South Africa and use this fund to break into other countries in Africa.

We do have footholds for some years back in Kenya, in Nigeria and also in Egypt. To some extent in Turkey and the Middle East as well.

Investing in companies that address emerging markets and e-commerce, parts of Amadeus’ digital prosperity fund has previously benefitted high-profile internet businesses such as Europe’s Lastminute.com.

In terms of the size of the investment, it’s just commensurate with the size of the market opportunity that Travelstart has and market leadership it has.

So, we feel that it totally justifies the investment.

Amadeus was founded in 1997 and its website says it has raised over $1bn for investment and backed more than 100 companies in the software, mobile, internet, cyber security and medical technology sectors.

[source: fin24]