Omio raises $10 million to expand travel booking in Japan and Southeast Asia

Berlin-based travel booking platform Omio has received a $10 million strategic investment from Granite-Integral to expand in Japan and Southeast Asia. The company did not disclose a valuation or other deal terms, but said the funding will support transport partnerships, hiring in Japan and AI development in Singapore.

The round comes in the same week Omio agreed to acquire Rail Europe, a transaction it said would create a combined business selling more than 22 million rail tickets a year through 28,000 transport operators and travel sellers. If completed, that deal would deepen Omio’s rail inventory at a time when travel platforms are trying to make fragmented trip planning feel closer to a single checkout.

Omio was founded in 2013 as GoEuro by Naren Shaam, an Indian-born Harvard Business School graduate, after he encountered difficulties booking train and bus travel across European countries. The company rebranded as Omio in 2019 as it moved beyond its original European focus.

Omio said the new capital will help it expand relationships with regional transport operators and grow its teams in Japan. It also plans to build up its AI-focused technology hub in Singapore, where the company says it is developing tools for search, comparison and booking across different modes of travel.

Shaam said Japan remains difficult for international visitors to book beyond major cities because journeys often involve multiple operators and modes of transport. He said Granite-Integral’s regional knowledge would help Omio accelerate its work in Japan and Southeast Asia.

Japan expansion follows local launch

Omio said the investment follows its launch in Japan, where it has seen demand from international travelers visiting both the Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka corridor and less central destinations, including mountain regions, coastal communities and cultural sites. The company did not disclose Japan-specific booking volume, revenue or user growth.

Across its broader business, Omio says it offers bookable transport in 47 countries, sells more than 100,000 tickets each day and reaches more than one billion users annually through Omio and Rome2Rio. Those figures were provided by the company and were not broken out by region or product line.

The Asia push puts Omio in markets where cross-border and multimodal travel can be operationally complex. Rail, bus, ferry and airline inventory is often split across local operators, ticketing rules and languages. Omio’s pitch is that aggregating those options can reduce friction for travelers and give operators international distribution.

Granite-Integral brings a Japan mandate

Granite-Integral is a joint venture between Singapore-based Granite Asia and Japanese private equity firm Integral Corporation. It launched in March 2025 with $100 million in committed capital to back technology scale-ups expanding into Japan.

CK Choun, co-head of Granite-Integral, said Japan and Southeast Asia are long-term opportunities in travel and described Omio’s multimodal platform as differentiated. The investor did not disclose whether the $10 million investment came from the joint venture’s committed capital or whether it includes any operational partnership commitments.

AI claims meet a crowded travel market

Omio is framing part of the expansion around AI, particularly recommendation engines and itinerary planning. The company has not provided technical benchmarks, adoption rates for AI features or a timeline for specific product releases in Asia.

The positioning puts Omio alongside other travel technology companies using AI as a product and fundraising theme. Navan listed on Nasdaq in October after an IPO that raised roughly $923 million and is focused on AI-enabled corporate travel. Hopper has raised $740 million in total funding for predictive pricing and travel fintech products. TravelPerk closed a $200 million Series E round in January 2025 for its business travel platform.

Omio’s distinction is its consumer-facing aggregation of rail, buses, ferries and flights, rather than a narrower focus on flights or corporate travel. The company says it plans to grow from 47 markets today to more than 70 by 2028, with Japan and Southeast Asia central to that expansion.

This story draws on original reporting from TechFundingNews.