CONNECT WITH US
Tech

Tech

OpenAI acquires Odessia, travel startup created by Sonder founder

TechCrunch - Startups logo

Published on

Add as a preferred source on Google
OpenAI acquires Odessia, travel startup created by Sonder founder

OpenAI has acquired an AI travel agent called Odessia, according to Odessia’s founder, Francis Davidson. Davidson says in a post announcing the deal that he’s now working for OpenAI, helping the AI lab with the future of travel.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but this looks like an acqui-hire. Davidson’s announcement focused largely on how he built his AI travel agent Odessia by directing teams of AI agents. The year-old Odessia raised a $6 million pre-seed round led by Sequoia and launched its AI travel agent around five months ago. Davidson says that it had helped early adopters plan millions of dollars’ worth of travel, but the tool has already been shut down.

An OpenAI spokesperson confirmed the hire to TechCrunch. “We’re thrilled to welcome Francis to OpenAI. Francis is a proven founder who has built multiple businesses to help people travel, and we’re excited he’s chosen to build with us.”

However the AI lab has not announced new travel-specific products or plans. It does, however, count such companies as Bookings.com, Expedia, and KAYAK as customers or partners. Travel is also one of the main areas that people are using personal AI assistants to help with. And, back in July 2025, when OpenAI launched its ChatGPT agent, it mentioned travel as one of its potential uses.

OpenAI’s spokesperson didn’t have more to share on its plans for travel-related products, except to say that travel is one of the areas that chatbot users frequently ask about. 2 billion people turn to ChatGPT each week for help with everyday tasks — from understanding their health, figuring out what to make for dinner, building a budget, and even planning a trip.


Source link
Related Topics:Tech

Disclaimer

We strive to uphold the highest ethical standards in all of our reporting and coverage. We TheMorningPulse.fyi want to be transparent with our readers about any potential conflicts of interest that may arise in our work. It's possible that some of the investors we feature may have connections to other businesses, including competitors or companies we write about. However, we want to assure our readers that this will not have any impact on the integrity or impartiality of our reporting. We are committed to delivering accurate, unbiased news and information to our audience, and we will continue to uphold our ethics and principles in all of our work. Thank you for your trust and support.