Latest news with #SanjeevShenoy
Mint
4 days ago
- Business
- Mint
AI travel startup Airial has built a tool that can plan your holiday in seconds
Planning a holiday often means juggling flights, hotels, local transport and activities across multiple websites or paying a premium to a travel agency to do it for you. Now, a wave of AI travel startups is working to change that. With artificial intelligence gaining traction in the travel industry, companies are racing to build tools that can handle end-to-end trip planning. One such player is Airial, a travel-tech startup founded by two former Meta engineers, Archit Karandikar and Sanjeev Shenoy, that promises to simplify the process. Its AI-powered platform creates personalised itineraries within seconds, covering everything from bookings to restaurant suggestions, all in one place. Airial lets users input basic travel details, such as starting and ending locations, to generate a full itinerary. The platform includes flights, hotel bookings, local transport, restaurant suggestions, and tourist attractions. Users can either set their preferences up front or make changes after viewing the suggested plan. The interface offers an overview of the entire trip, with clickable segments for daily plans. Users can explore each activity to view location, reviews, suggestions and alternatives. The tool also includes a map view that displays all the places scheduled for the day, helping users understand the distance and time required to travel between points. It also accounts for transit time, wait periods at stations and the possibility of nearby day trips. In addition, the platform can answer queries about specific places and tailor recommendations to user preferences. Social media and creator integration One of Airial's newer features allows users to add content from creators. A user can link a blog, TikTok or Instagram Reel and add locations mentioned in the content to their itinerary. The tool can also surface relevant TikTok videos based on the user's destination and preferences. Additionally, Airial supports trip sharing and collaborative planning. It has included cars and buses in multi-city travel options. Users can view trips created by friends and make modifications, bringing a social element to the planning process. Founded by former Meta engineers Airial was founded by Archit Karandikar and Sanjeev Shenoy, who were college friends in India. Karandikar previously worked in engineering roles at Meta, Google, and Waymo, focusing on AI-based products. Shenoy worked at Meta as well, with the Instagram Reels team. The founders said their shared interest in travel led them to build a product that could function like a detailed digital travel agent. 'Most platforms just help you build a rough plan. We focus on logistics, connecting dozens of APIs and factoring in multiple parameters like transfer time, hotel proximity, and transit availability,' said Karandikar in an interview with TechCrunch. The startup's AI model is based in part on research from a DeepMind paper called AlphaGeometry, which focuses on solving complex geometry problems. Airial combines this inference method with large language models (LLMs) to create personalised travel plans. Airial has raised $3 million in seed funding led by Montage Ventures, with participation from South Park Commons, Peak XV (formerly Sequoia India) and angel investors from companies like Meta, Dropbox, and UiPath. The company claims to have 'tens of thousands' of monthly users. For now, its focus is on user growth rather than monetisation. In the near future, Airial plans to launch iOS and Android apps and add vertical search options for hotels, activities and influencer-generated content.
Business Insider
6 days ago
- Business
- Business Insider
AI startup Airial turns travel TikToks into bookable itineraries. Read its pitch deck that helped it land $3 million.
Airial has raised $3 million in seed funding to help vacationers distill social content into actionable travel plans. Montage Ventures led the round, which included participation from South Park Commons and Peak XV. In addition to deriving itineraries from TikToks, Instagram Reels, and travel blogs, users can make and refine plans by entering information about their interests, budgets, and schedules. "People don't want cookie-cutter trips," Airial cofounder and CTO Sanjeev Shenoy told Business Insider. "They want all of this heavily customized, and they want the rest of the pieces to be handled seamlessly." The roughly two-year-old company was cofounded by Shenoy and Archit Karandikar, both avid travelers who left their engineering jobs at Meta and Waymo, respectively, to build Airial. The San Francisco-based company, with offices in India, has nine employees. After launching a public beta last year, a mobile app will come in the third quarter, said Karandikar, Airial's CEO. Rather than producing a basic list of activities, Karandikar said Airial uses AI reasoning, which drills down into "the hundreds of little constraints and dependencies that come up" while planning a trip. This includes logistics like choosing the closest airports and hotels to desired sites and the best connections for buses and trains. Airial isn't the only startup looking to use AI to change the massive online travel agencies market. AI competitors include Mindtrip and Layla, while established players like Expedia are also forging partnerships with OpenAI and Google. Karandikar said Airial focuses on user growth and eventually plans to make money by sharing revenue on hotel bookings and flights. It's also exploring advertising, freemium AI features, and a creator program where influencers can sell their itineraries. Here's a look at the pitch deck that Airial Travel used to raise $3 million in seed funding. "Just imagine your trip, and Airial it!" "Retention is key to both margin and scale. The personal touch drives retention in travel." "We understand AI, Optimization, and Social Products."
Business Insider
6 days ago
- Business
- Business Insider
AI startup Airial turns travel TikToks into bookable itineraries. Read its pitch deck that helped it land $3 million.
Aspirational travel content runs rampant on social media, and now, an AI startup called Airial Travel wants to help bring the wanderlust offline. Airial has raised $3 million in seed funding to help vacationers distill social content into actionable travel plans. Montage Ventures led the round, which included participation from South Park Commons and Peak XV. In addition to deriving itineraries from TikToks, Instagram Reels, and travel blogs, users can make and refine plans by entering information about their interests, budgets, and schedules. "People don't want cookie-cutter trips," Airial cofounder and CTO Sanjeev Shenoy told Business Insider. "They want all of this heavily customized, and they want the rest of the pieces to be handled seamlessly." The roughly two-year-old company was cofounded by Shenoy and Archit Karandikar, both avid travelers who left their engineering jobs at Meta and Waymo, respectively, to build Airial. The San Francisco-based company, with offices in India, has nine employees. After launching a public beta last year, a mobile app will come in the third quarter, said Karandikar, Airial's CEO. Rather than producing a basic list of activities, Karandikar said Airial uses AI reasoning, which drills down into "the hundreds of little constraints and dependencies that come up" while planning a trip. This includes logistics like choosing the closest airports and hotels to desired sites and the best connections for buses and trains. Airial isn't the only startup looking to use AI to change the massive online travel agencies market. AI competitors include Mindtrip and Layla, while established players like Expedia are also forging partnerships with OpenAI and Google. Karandikar said Airial focuses on user growth and eventually plans to make money by sharing revenue on hotel bookings and flights. It's also exploring advertising, freemium AI features, and a creator program where influencers can sell their itineraries.
