Southeast Asia’s travel industry has roared back from the COVID-19 pandemic, and a new generation of founders is betting that the region’s next big travel wins won’t come from another flight-and-hotel search engine, but from the unglamorous plumbing around it: visas, eSIMs, hourly hotel bookings, corporate travel expense trails, and the local guides who make a trip memorable.
Between 2018 and 2024, dozens of traveltech startups quietly emerged across Jakarta, Ho Chi Minh City, Manila, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur and Singapore, chasing everything from capsule hotels and glamping cabins to AI-enabled visa infrastructure and self-guided city quests.
Also Read: The impact of eSIM on international roaming and travel
Some, like Indonesia’s Bobobox, have scaled into multi-country hospitality brands backed by the likes of Li Ka-shing’s Horizon Ventures. Others remain scrappy, single-city bets still hunting for their first cheque. Together, they map a region-wide reimagining of how people move, sleep, pay and explore.
Below, we round up 23 of these emerging Southeast Asian traveltech companies — their founders, funding, and the problem each is trying to solve — as a working reference for anyone tracking where the region’s travel economy goes next.
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Bobobox | Indonesia | 2018 | Indra Gunawan, Antonius Bong | Bandung-born hospitality-tech startup building IoT-enabled capsule hotels (Bobopod) and glamping cabins (Bobocabin) for budget-conscious and solo travellers across Indonesia. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Go2Joy | Vietnam | 2018 | Simon (SungMin) Byun, Yongsun Jang, Vesper Pham | Ho Chi Minh City-based app-based platform for booking hotel rooms by the hour, overnight or day, with the largest inventory of 1-2 star hotels in Vietnam. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Travelio | Indonesia | 2018 | Zulfaa Irbah Zain ( verify founder) | Jakarta-based rental platform and end-to-end property management firm managing thousands of apartments for short and long-stay travellers across Indonesia. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Passpod | Indonesia | 2018 | Digital tourist pass and connectivity provider offering travellers seamless data access and curated local attraction deals across Indonesia and beyond. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| SPUN Global | Indonesia | 2024 | Christa Sabathaly, Dilla Anindita | Jakarta-based AI-enabled visa infrastructure startup automating and simplifying fragmented visa processes for travellers across Southeast Asia. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| TUBUDD | Vietnam | 2021 | Huyen Minh Do | Ho Chi Minh City-based concierge platform matching international visitors with vetted local ‘buddies’ for authentic, guided experiences. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| VLeisure | Vietnam | 2018 | Phan Le | B2B global travel network out of Vietnam distributing hotels, transfers, tickets and excursions to travel partners. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| CREX | Singapore | 2022 | Sam Hon | AI-driven visibility and sustainability analytics platform helping hotels benchmark and improve their digital presence and ESG credentials. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Truely | Singapore | 2022 | Simon Landsheer | eSIM connectivity startup offering a single ‘Switchless’ SIM that automatically connects travellers to the best local network and rates in every country. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Flow App | Singapore | 2021 | Hourly hotel booking platform letting urban travellers pay only for the hours of stay they actually need. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Questo | Singapore | 2020 | Mulyadi Syariffudin, Yock Song Law | Creator-enabled platform for self-guided city quests, letting travellers discover destinations through gamified trails. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| DailyPass.com | Singapore | 2018 | Christophe Secher | Daycation marketplace letting locals book hotel day-experiences without an overnight stay, unlocking incremental revenue for hotels. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Cocotel | Philippines | 2021 | Rafael Jouwena | Budget beach-hotel chain and booking platform delivering affordable, quality-value stays across Philippine island destinations |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Travelstop | Singapore | 2018 | Prashant Vishwas Kirtane | Corporate travel and expense management SaaS platform streamlining business trip booking and reconciliation for companies. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Vouch | Singapore | 2021 | Joseph Ling, Yap Mingyang | Interface and CRM tooling startup helping hotels and hospitality businesses simplify guest-facing digital operations. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| ASCENT | Singapore | 2018 | Darren Tng | Helicopter ride-sharing platform backed by venture builder REAPRA, letting flyers skip road traffic across Singapore. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Deemples | Malaysia | 2019 | David Wong | Platform matching golfers travelling for leisure with playing partners, filling tee-times that would otherwise go unused. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Tourkrub | Thailand | 2018 | Thai marketplace helping travellers compare and understand tour packages from a fragmented field of travel agencies. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Experience Philippines | Philippines | 2019 | Giancarlo Gallegos | Global platform of curated experiences turning everyday outings into shareable travel adventure stories for visitors to the Philippines. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Sakay.ph | Philippines | 2019 | Philip Cheang | Manila-based website and app providing real-time commuting and transit directions for travellers and daily commuters navigating Metro Manila. |
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| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Trip.Club | Philippines | 2018 | Menchie Dizon | Manila-based business travel platform managing corporate trip bookings so companies don’t have to handle unmanaged travel themselves. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Big Tiny | Singapore | 2018 | Adrian Chia | Tiny-house hospitality startup hosting travellers in eco-conscious tiny homes across rural Southeast Asian getaway destinations. |
| Company | Country | Founded in | Founder(s) | Description |
| Drivemate | Thailand | 2018 | Bangkok-based peer-to-peer car-sharing marketplace — often dubbed the ‘Airbnb for cars’ — letting travellers rent vehicles directly from owners. |
The post The unsexy side of SEA traveltech: eSIMs, visas and hourly hotels win big appeared first on e27.
